I'm a Farmer!

Well, I guess I'm not technically a farmer as in "I wake up before the sun to work, drive a tractor and have a zillion acres of property to keep up with." I'm more of a "Hey, there is a rhubarb plant in my backyard so I'ma maybe put that to use" type farmer.


Wait... I'm not really a farmer at all, am I? :(


But I sure felt like one when I harvested my first home-grown plant and used it for cooking over the weekend! I was really concerned, because I've never used anything from my own backyard to cook before, and I've only actually baked with rhubarb once in my life (last fall). But I was determined to whip up a homemade strawberry-rhubarb cobbler for our (very rainy) cookout on Sunday.


It started out like this:

And ended like this:

All things considered, not too shabby.


Once the Almighty Google steered me in the right direction, I headed out to the backyard and gently pulled about six stalks of rhubarb from the stem. I cut off the (poisonous!) leaves, and then chopped everything up. At the same time, I sliced a few perfectly-ripe strawberries (which I did not harvest from the backyard... that will come soon, hopefully).

Next, I mixed the berries 'n 'barb with sugar, corn starch and orange zest and let it sit for half an hour to get all the juices mingling and sweet on each other.

In the meantime, I whipped up the crust for the cobbler. Whisked together all the dry ingredients:

Then added some milk.

By that point, the sweet stuff had been mingling long enough, so I dumped it in a square glass baking dish, then plopped a few dollops of the dough on top and spread it around.

I also added a little Turbinado sugar on top, for extra crunch.


Then, in it went to the oven for half an hour, and that was it! So incredibly easy, and it received rave reviews all around. I felt so proud! The only thing missing was a side of vanilla-bean ice cream.

You can find the full recipe here. It really did turn out fantastic, and I'm looking forward to having a leftover slice tonight!




But there are two other foods that definitely did not last for leftovers:

S'mores brownies (Gang, these are dangerous - incredibly delicious and ridiculously easy to whip up. You've been warned!)

Rainbow fruit kabobs. I had to incorporate something healthy into the meal - and they were just too darn cute to pass up!


Aside from the above treats, we had burgers and brats on pretzel buns (Seriously good), crunchy Asian coleslaw and super-amazing guac and chips. Not that I'll be stepping on a scale anytime soon to confirm, but I'm fairly certain I gained five pounds over the weekend.


And it was worth it!



Did you go to any Memorial-Day cookouts over the weekend? What did you eat?