Ever since living in France, I have found that I have an inner love affair with dessert. I blame France because prior, I had never been a baker and didn’t grow up in a family that ate a lot of sweets. That being said, my blog roll sure is baker/food/chocolate heavy and I am always ok with “taking a look at the dessert menu” when out to eat. It’s no secret that France is known to have some amazing pâtisserie, so I blame the French for my love handles.
Dessert has even, more than once, become my whole meal at times. These two pictures below were breakfast and lunch (not on the same day of course). THe first was a pancake (more like a cake, cake) with fruit and Nutella that should never be consumed alone. The second was a delicious coffee stop at Dean & DeLuca which ultimately put me in a sugar comma that I had to run off later in the afternoon.
Most of the time, I find the crave for sweets is when I am bored and so rather than buy and indulge, I find less guilt from baking and then pigging out. A few months ago, when I was still living at home, I found a recipe on one of my favorite blogs and made a little Rhubarb pie.
Here is the original recipe, which I changed a tad to make into one large pie. I learned about Rhubarb (and many other atypical foods) while living in France. I remember eating lovely homemade (not by me of course) rhubarb tartes with the family. Although not a simple tarte, it was a delicious pie and one that I might just make again for Thanksgiving this year.
Side note: I used frozen rhubarb that was already chopped up. This didn’t seem to make a large difference but I do suggest waiting until they are completely defrosted so that the excess juices are gone. I was a bit impatient with this step (reason #1 that I am not a great baker) and ended up with a bit more soupy of a pie than intended. The soup overflowed onto the stove bottom too, so don’t forget to lay down some foil to catch any soupy overflow. Note: This soupyness will subside after it cools.
Becoming French 