late middle English (denoting the rootstock of other plants of this genus used medicinally) from Old French reubarbe, from a shortening of medieval latin rheubarbarum , (alteration by association with rheum 'rhubarb') of rhabarbarum 'foreign rhubarb' from Greek rha (also meaning rhubarb) + barbaros 'foreign'.
Glad to have cleared that up for you.
Anyway. Recipe followers might like to know about the following variation: add the zest of a lemon to the crumble mix. And since it's in your hand you may as well add the juice of the lemon to the rhubarb. The lemon zest is discretely** undetectable and the lemon juice keeps the rhabarbarum alive (given that it is easy to kill it by adding too much sugar on account of it being so sour - maybe I just got lucky last night but the rheubarbarum was the tastiest I've managed to get it last night and I blame the lemon juice).
What I suspect would work very well would be to use the crushed coriander seeds and lemon zest. I'll save that one for a very special occasion. Meanwhile we have guests tonight and I'm contemplating a deviant ground elder soup. Perhaps that should be variant?
** Of course that should be discreetly - but how many of you noticed? The English language is such a joy.
Here endeth the lesson.
2 comments:
Been wanting to tell you that I made your crumble a few weeks ago and still love the recipe in all its detailed specificity. Can see the lemon juice adding to it but coriander seeds?? Hmm... wouldn't have thought of that but do let us know how it turns out. I just added some strawberries, always works well...
Thanks for dropping by Pedi,
To be honest - the coriander seeds work best if it's an apple crumble - but it does work honest!
And yes - rhubarb and strawberry is a classic combination. In fact we even have a kid, called rhubarb but nicknamed strawberry. But I'm not sure what that has to do with anything.
Hope things get better for you soon.
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