Eat your veggies for dessert

I love rhubarb. It's tart and tangy , cooks up a pretty shade of pink, and is easy to grow in my garden. It's good stewed over ice cream or cooked into muffins, but nothing beats a rhubarb pie. It's the vegetable version of sour gummy worms!

The only downside to rhubarb is my dear husband. He won't even try the stuff; calls it red celery. So unless I want to eat the entire pie by myself, I have to find someone else who loves rhubarb, and most of them are in nursing homes! Come on, people under 80! Try something old!

To encourage a return to the "good ol' days" of rhubarb eating, I'm posting my favorite pie recipe. So run, don't walk, to your nearest green grocer (or pull it out of your elderly neighbors yard), purchase a bunch of red celery, and bake up a pie tonight!

Rhubarb Pie
(this is the recipe my mom uses from an old Betty Crocker cookbook)

Prepare pastry for a two-crust pie:

2 cups all purpose flour

1 tsp. salt

2/3 plus 2 Tbsp. shortening

4 to 6 Tbsp. cold water

Measure flour and salt into mixing bowl. With pastry blender, cut in shortening until particles are the size of peas. Sprinkle in water bit by bit, mixing until all flour is moistened and dough almost cleans the sides of the bowl. Roll out two crusts. Line 9" pie plate with one and fold the other in quarters, making slits on the folds for vents. Set aside.

Make filling:

1-3/4 cups sugar

1/2 cup flour
1/2 tsp. grated orange peel

5 cups cut up fresh rhubarb (1/2 inch pieces)

3 Tbsp. butter

Preheat oven to 425. Stir together flour, sugar, and orange peel. Put half of the rhubarb into the pastry-lined pie plate, sprinkle with half the sugar mixture, and repeat with remaining rhubarb and sugar mixture. Dot with butter and cover with top crust. Seal the edges. Bake for 40-50 minutes. You may need to lay foil over the top if the crust starts to brown. I cook mine with a cookie sheet underneath to avoid cleaning the oven if the rhubarb spills over. Cool to room temperature before eating.

This post is dedicated to my Mom and Dad (who are not over 80) for driving out for the weekend and sharing my pie!