Thursday, July 05, 2007

Weekend Cookbook Challenge 18 - Red and White

This month is the 18th month of Weekend Cookbook Challenge, if you can believe it. I'm the host this time around and I thought it might be fun to have another color theme - Orange was the theme for #3 - so I picked Red and White. (The fact that Canada Day and Independence Day are in July may have factored in too.)

I thought I'd start by picking a cookbook that had one of the colors on the cover. I picked that old favorite, Betty Crocker.


Since I fulfilled my theme requirement, I flipped through the book to just choose what ever recipe tickled my fancy. And my fancy was tickled by a fool. A strawberry and rhubarb fool! Last month Shaun at Winter Skies, Kitchen Aglow wrote about Blackberry Fool and it looked delicious. A fool is a British dessert and is fruit that is mashed up and mixed with whipped cream, but not mixed so thoroughly to completely combine the two - you want the dessert to be streaky with the fruit and cream. I've been wanting to make a fool for a long time, mostly because of the name. We aren't big dessert eaters, so this was the perfect opportunity.

I loved this dessert! It was delicious and quite beautiful. Looky!


The dessert was very light and refreshing, and the two main ingredients, rhubarb and strawberries are in abundance right now. Once the strawberries and rhubarb have been cooked and cooled, this is very quick to make too. If you like tasty desserts, (um, who doesn't??) give this a try. You won't be sorry.

Rhubarb Strawberry Fool
adapted from Betty Crocker's 40th Anniversary Edition Cookbook

make the rhubarb strawberry sauce:

mix together in a pot over medium high heat
1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup water and bring to a boil.

add
4 cups chopped rhubarb
and simmer for 10 minutes until tender. stir in
1 cup sliced strawberries
return to the boil, then remove from heat and refrigerate until cold, 2-3 hours.

then:
mix the sauce into
1 cup non fat sour cream

beat
1 cup whipping cream until stiff. stir into the sauce/sour cream mixture. do not incorporate completely; make sure the dessert is streaky with white cream and red fruit sauce.

pour into one large bowl or 6 individual bowls.

sprinkle with brown sugar before serving.

There's still tons of time to join in Weekend Cookbook Challenge 18. So cook up a dish having something to do with Red or White, and send it to me by July 15. My email is iliketocook at shaw dot ca.




Have a great weekend!

14 comments:

MyKitchenInHalfCups said...

Think I could cheat and use cool whip?
That's really pretty!

Cheryl said...

You are the only other person besides myself that ever made a "fool". This looks amazing.

Sara said...

Tanna - it is pretty isn't it! I don't think I've ever had cool whip, but I can't see why it wouldn't work.
Let me know if you try it.

Cheryl - I am going to be making other fools this summer, I think. I'd like to use raspberries and booze. mmmmmmmmmmmmm.....

Shaun said...

Sara, darling - Your rhubarb and strawberry fool looks beautiful! I am keen to make this, too, and am certain it tastes a million times better than mine with canned blackberries! I'm still deciding what to make for the WCC...decisions, decisions...

Judy said...

What a neat idea...I can think of a few other red and white dishes too!

Rhubarb and strawberry seem perfect for each other, don't they?

Anonymous said...

The fool looks just delicious... Except my brain at first interpreted the photo at being the same scale as the first photo, which meant that the fool was HUGE! :)

I'm still looking for a red and white dish.

Sara said...

Shaun - thank you for your praise! I am looking forward to experimenting more with fool. I don't think I have ever had a blackberry before, perhaps I should try that. Keep looking for a WCC recipe - I want to see you there!!

Judy - they are made for each other, I think.

Sarah - Hope to see you at WCC too!

The Glitterati said...

Oh that looks so yummy! I've made berry etons before (I think they're called etons... they're basically just berries, whipped cream, and crumbled meringue nests) but never thought to use rhubarb. That's for the great idea!

Amanda at Little Foodies said...

Lovely! I am an genuine April Fool and love Fools of all kinds, foodie or otherwise. :)

Ruth Daniels said...

Great theme. All my books are still packed, but I'll see what I can find on my daughter's bookshelves.

I'm thinking something strawberry...

Sara said...

tg - if only i knew about etons before i threw out my rock hard merengues, they would have been perfect!

amanda - me too.

ruth - our strawberries couldn't be better right now. we're in seventh heaven...

Lis said...

Your fool looks sooo good! We're off to TJ's tomorrow so I'm going to pick up more of their strawberries and some whipping cream. Yay!

xoxo

Anonymous said...

I've never tried a fool before, but it sounds delicious. I've also never tried the strawberry rhubarb combo that I'm seeing everywhere right now. This would be a great way to dive right in!

test it comm said...

This looks like another amazing way of combining strawberry and rhubarb!