Plate to Plate

If Dan is the baker of the relationship, I’m the pastry chef.

Now, that’s not saying much, as my pastry experience depends heavily on a short list of staple favorites, like Deborah Madison’s yeasted sugar cake (Dan’s birthday staple), fruity muffins, and sweet, rich quickbreads. But there’s something about these easy, chemically-leavened goodies that appeals to the recipe-tinkerer in me — they seem hard to completely screw up.

Let this be a warning to you, my friends: they can be screwed up.

The screw-up in question this time is a recipe for rhubarb bars, a confection meant to be earthy, oaty, and a little bit sweet. Nutritious and portable. Oh, and, you know, edible. Alas and alack, things did not pan out as I’d planned.

Dan was working on a food photoshoot last week, and came home with some perishable spoils, namely, a small container of raspberries. Why let them go to waste, I thought, and having just harvested a bunch of rhubarb from the garden, I promptly began planning my raspberry rhubarb bar recipe. I spent nearly all of Saturday in the kitchen, blending and stirring and mixing. (Admittedly, much of that time was taken up by this recipe, for amazing black bean brownies — I kid you not — which I brought to a gluten-free friend’s birthday party, whereupon they were decimated. Stunningly delicious, I tell you.)

What went into the oven was a beautiful compote of raspberry, rhubarb, and maple syrup, topped with an oat, brown sugar, and pecan struesel. What came out was a bit of a mess. It tastes good, I assure you, but it’s not a bar by any means — these are not an on-the-go treat, but more like a crumble or a crisp. And, like most sane humans, I love sweet fruits topped with sweet oats and nuts (and ice cream), but it wasn’t exactly the recipe I was going for.

Plus, there’s a lot left over. Anyone hungry?