Rhubarb Streusel Pie

This is it. The best rhubarb pie in the world. Did you hear me? THE. BEST. Perfect crust. Tangy-sweet rhubarb flavored with vanilla bean. Crumbly, crunchy, nutty streusel topping. This afternoon I'm planning to make my fourth in a span of two weeks, because if I'm with people, I need them to be eating this pie. And I need to be eating it. I ate almost the whole first one by myself.

I mean, I had help. A little. In the person of a tiny baby girl who is making her presence known more and more each day with kicks and jabs to my abdomen.



I'm a late sharer of pregnancy news online. I so love telling people in person and seeing their reactions; hugs and squeals of excitement and actual congratulations are SO MUCH BETTER than Facebook likes and comments. When mostly everyone knows, and it's starting to be visible no matter what, then I finally share the news online. It's a girl, and she's healthy! I'm feeling great.

{Apparently, I like to announce I'm having baby girls by sharing recipes for pink vegetables. Last time, Radish Pickles! And more thoughts about the weighty responsibility of raising girls into women. Head over to check it out.}

Rhubarb season is just warming up in the Midwest, so you have plenty of time to get some reddish pink treasure from the farmers market and make yourself and those you love an amazing pie.



Rhubarb Streusel Pie

I always, always use Heidi Swanson's pie crust recipe, and it is amazing every time.

Filling:
5 cups (about 2 pounds) fresh rhubarb, chopped into 1-inch pieces
1 cup sugar
1/2 vanilla bean (or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract or vanilla bean paste)
3 tablespoons tapioca starch (corn starch will also work)

Topping:
1/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar
3/4 cup finely chopped walnuts
1/4 cup butter, cut into cubes
3/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup flour

Make the crust and refrigerate it until ready to use (making it a day ahead of time breaks up the effort required to make the pie, and ensures the crust is fully chilled - win-win).

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees.

Place the sugar in a small bowl with the vanilla bean (if using), and use your fingertips to rub the sugar along the inside of the vanilla bean, scraping out the seeds and distributing them through the sugar. (You could also do this ahead of time - the vanilla flavor will be more pronounced if you leave the vanilla bean in the sugar for a while.)

Place the chopped rhubarb in a large bowl with the vanilla sugar (or sugar and vanilla extract/paste) and tapioca starch and stir to combine. Set aside for about 15 minutes, while you prepare the crust and topping.

In a small bowl, stir together brown sugar, walnuts, cinnamon, salt and flour. Add the butter, and use your fingers to rub it into the sugar mixture until well-combined.

Roll out the crust and fit it into a pie plate. Decoratively crimp the edges, and pour the rhubarb filling into the crust, being sure to scrape all of the sugar and juice out of the bowl. Sprinkle the topping evenly over the fruit (ahem, vegetable) filling and slide into the oven. Bake at 450 for 15 minutes, then decrease the heat to 350 and continue baking for 50-60 minutes, until the filling is bubbling, and the topping and crust are golden.

Cool at least 2 hours before slicing, and serve with vanilla ice cream.

7 Quick Takes: Pregnancy Edition!

In case you didn't read yesterday's post carefully enough, that's right! I'm pregnant! And so today, 7 random things that I've wanted to say over the past few months, but haven't been able to lest I prematurely spill the beans! Go see Jen for more quick takes!

- 1 -

There is no sweeter sound to a pregnant lady's ears than to hear someone say, "You look great." No matter how excited I am to be sharing my body with this little person I'm growing, there are times when I just look in the mirror and can't muster a happy thought about what I look like. To hear someone else tell me I look nice really makes my day. (Side note: I don't know how people go back to wearing regular pants, after having worn maternity pants. I'm just saying.)

- 2 -

You can eat soft cheese all you WANT! I am really not good at following rules if I don't understand the reasoning behind them, and since there are some things you're supposed to avoid while pregnant (and I will not take your word for it), I decided to read the fine print. Fact: soft cheese is fine, as long as it's made with pasteurized milk. Do you know how hard it is to even find soft cheese that's made with raw milk? Almost impossible. So indulge in that bacon and bleu cheese burger, or the goat cheese salad, or crackers with Brie, or whatever it is that you're craving. It's perfectly safe. Sushi? Still no. Deli meat? Only if you heat it up to steaming beforehand. All of this is to avoid exposure to Listeria, a bacteria that is easily fought off by adult immune systems, but is a threat to a growing fetus.

- 3 -

Another thing you can have? Coffee. When I was so tired that I could barely make it through the morning without taking a nap under my desk, my morning coffee was an absolute life-saver. The last thing you need when you're more exhausted than you've ever been, and nauseated on top of that, is to have a caffeine-withdrawal migraine. Of course, if you drink coffee all day long, you should probably cut back. But a cup in the morning is perfectly fine and poses no risk to the baby.

- 4 -

It's possible that crackers will not be the best relief for morning sickness. In my first trimester, I had to eat about every 30 minutes to keep nausea at bay, but anything carby or sweet made me feel sicker. No crackers or bread or other things you think you should eat when you're nauseated. Nope, this baby of mine wanted scrambled eggs, cheese, and chicken. Weird, I know. As soon as the constant queasiness went away (Hallelujah!), I started balancing my diet back out again. Lots of fruit, veggies, whole milk dairy (I'm planning to dedicate a whole post to why later), and fatty fish, like salmon. And tons and tons of water.

- 5 -

Prenatal yoga is amazing. I went to my first class last week, and plan to try to take a class once a week until the baby comes. I took one regular yoga class a few weeks ago, and there were a fair number of poses I couldn't comfortably do, so I enjoy a class that's geared toward pregnant women. It also helps keep me in a calm mental space, so that when people start bombarding me with their well-meaning advice and compulsive labor and delivery war stories, I can just let it roll right off.

- 6 -

The book Baby Bargains is a great resource to help you wade through all the many, many brands and styles and types of things people will tell you you absolutely must have in order to safely and adequately raise your baby. It's part guidance from a close friend who's been where you're going, part deluxe all-inclusive Consumer Reports. A huge help as we were starting to put together our registry.

- 7 -

Here's what I looked like at 17 weeks :)

Radish Pickles

I always buy radishes in the spring. They're so colorful, peeking out from rows and rows of baby greens and asparagus at the market. Especially these Easter egg ones - a purple vegetable will always have a special place in my heart. But here's what happens. I get excited when I see them. I buy them and take them home. They sit in the fridge, lonely and sad, until they get all wrinkly and semi-soft, and then... I throw them away.

That is crazy talk.



Thing is, until I thought of this idea, I did not know what to do with a whole bunch of radishes. A single solitary radish thinly sliced and mixed with salad greens? That I can handle. A whole bunch? What do I look like, some kind of radish fiend? I can't handle that much radish action. For how cute and pastel-colored they are, those suckers are spicy and assertive!

Speaking of things that are cute and pastel-colored, but can be spicy and assertive... we are expecting a little baby girl! She should make her big debut in November, and we can't wait to meet her. In the past couple of days, I've been thinking about what a weighty responsibility it is to teach a girl how to be a woman. There's just so much I want to make sure she knows, so much that I hope for her life.

I want to teach her that she should only laugh when boys are actually being funny, not just because they're being boys. I want her to be healthy and happy in her own skin. I want her to have a soaring imagination and a fabulous sense of humor. And I want her to know how to take a vegetable she doesn't really love and turn it into pink pickles!



This is my new favorite thing to do with radishes. I've tried cooking them, and it wasn't bad. It's just that, ok, what gives a radish its inherent radish-ness? It's crispy and spicy. If you cook it, it's soft and not spicy. It's not horrible, it just doesn't really remind me of a radish anymore. These pickles take radishes to the next level - they don't have the same raw bite, but they're still crispy and a little spicy.



Radish Pickles

Substitute these any place a normal pickle would go. One delicious option: piled on buttered toast, and sparingly salted. Actually, taste first to see if they need salt, since the brine is already pretty salty.

1 bunch radishes, any variety, washed and sliced thinly
1 clove garlic, peeled
1 cup water
1 cup white vinegar
2 teaspoons kosher salt
2 teaspoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon crushed peppercorns

Pack the sliced radishes and the garlic into a pint Mason jar. In a medium saucepan, combine water, vinegar, salt and sugar over medium heat and stir until dissolved. Add the peppercorns and pour the brine over the radishes. Screw the lid on tightly and allow to come to room temperature. Refrigerate for 24 hours. Voila pickles!

Can be kept in the refrigerator up to a month.

Yield: one pint.

Slow-Roasted Wild Salmon

I've been reading Nina Planck's Real Food: What to Eat and Why a little before bed each night for the past couple of weeks. It's making me feel really good about making food decisions that are extremely, ridiculously pleasant. Like whole, pastured, non-homogenized (when I can find it) dairy, which tastes so, so much better than its non- or low-fat counterparts. Or grass-fed beef, which is naturally lean, tastes amazing, and is chock-full of healthy cholesterol. Or pastured eggs, with their bright orange, protein- and omega-3-rich yolks.



Then there's wild salmon, the chapter I'm currently reading. I'm beginning to believe that wild salmon is the answer to all modern health issues. People who eat salmon once a week are at a decreased risk of heart attack, stroke, heart arrhythmia, high blood pressure, and high triglycerides in the blood. Omega-3s help to regulate blood sugar and suppress insulin resistance. It's been well-documented and publicized that DHA, a type of omega-3 fatty acid found in high concentrations in salmon, is vital for fetal and infant development, but why? Our brains are made of about 60% fat, and the most important type of fat is - you guessed it - DHA! DHA consumption has been linked to higher IQ and brain function, and to a decreased risk of neural and spinal birth defects.

Ever heard of pregnancy brain? I'm starting to wonder how much of that little-understood, anecdotal symptom of pregnancy could be solved by a couple more servings of fish each week. Developing babies take the nutrients they need from their mothers, whether or not said mothers are conscious of the nutrients they consume. Since our bodies don't produce DHA, but store a lot of it in our brains, maybe those little fetuses are taking mom's brain in order to make their own! If you're pregnant and feeling strangely forgetful, or you'd like to reduce your risk of cardiovascular health issues and type-2 diabetes, make some salmon for dinner tonight!





Slow Roasted Salmon

adapted from Bon Appetit

Seek out wild salmon when you're shopping. Farmed salmon is higher in mercury, less sustainable, and much lower in omega-3s. It's also fed dye so that it looks like salmon. The flavor and texture of wild salmon are vastly superior.

2 six-ounce center-cut fillets wild salmon
3-4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
assorted fresh herbs, about a cup total (I used thyme, basil, and parsley - dill or rosemary would be great!)
salt

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Coat the bottom of a baking sheet with a couple tablespoons of the oil, and arrange the herbs in two piles, about the size of the salmon fillets. Lay the salmon skin-side down over the herbs, drizzle with another tablespoon oil, and season lightly with kosher salt. Bake about 25 minutes, until the salmon is just tender - a knife will slide easily into the flesh. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Serving suggestions: A bed of arugula and a chopped up tomato with a squeeze of lemon and a sprinkle of salt and pepper was perfect alongside this salmon when it came out of the oven. It would also be great with sauteed new potatoes and asparagus. I have a piece leftover in my fridge, and I plan to make a sandwich out of it on ciabatta, with lemon-dill-caper mayo and more arugula. Delicious!