rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb

Two kilos of rhubarb trimmed, washed, chopped, stewed, seived and made into sorbet. It's my daughter's favourite pudding, and the only think I know to do with rhubarb that everyone likes. The first time I made it was when Conor was a baby - so every evening Mr B would give Katherine her pudding while I bathed and fed Conor. One night about a week after I'd made the sorbet, Mr B commented when I'd finished with Conor that I'd need to make some more of that rhubarb sorbet as Katherine had loved it so much. The rhubarb sorbet. Correction: the rhubarb and vodka sorbet....

I guess I hadn't told him it wasn't for kids, and I guess he just let her pick what she wanted from the freezer, and I guess it was the only pink thing.

No wonder she slept so well that week.

Now I make it without the vodka - before anyone starts calling social services.

Anyway, with that confusion out of the way, it's time to clear up a couple of other confusions:

1. The lady's bag yesterday wasn't on fire - it was a disposable barbecue behind her bag. But yes: if it had been her bag on fire I would have taken a blip of it before telling her.

2. We are moving to France.... and Fife. Moving to France is the plan, but we'll probably need a brief interlude before going there which we'll fill in by staying in Fife. And no, I didn't just get confused between all the places beginning with F. I'm only blonde on the outside (well, sort of).

Our purchasers came round to see the house today. They're so excited. I kind of wished they'd stop going on about how wonderful our house is: made me not want to move!

Thank you for your wise words yesterday on Katherine's sorrows. She will be fine. But telling her that the friends you have at 8 aren't necessarily the ones you'll keep all your life is not the comfort when you're 8 that it feels like it should be looking back on life.

I'm going on too much (talk about rhubarb, rhubarb....) Mr B's been away all weekend - I'm feeling a bit starved of conversation.

At the risk of making this even longer... here's the recipe:

Trim and wash rhubarb and chop into small chunks. You want 2lbs prepared weight. Put in pan with half a pint of water and bring to the boil. Simmer for 10 mins till really soft. Add 12oz sugar and stir until dissolved. Strain through seive over bowl, in batches. Don't press down on it. (Takes a while.) Taste juice. Add sugar syrup if not sweet enough.

Cool.

When cold stir in 1tbsp (or a bit more) of lime juice and 4tbsp vodka (optional....) If it's not very pink, I sometimes add pink food colouring. Not sure that's better for children than vodka though.

Freeze in ice cream maker, or put in shallow plastic container, cover and put in fast-freeze compartment. Remove and mash with a fork every 30 mins or so.

Use pulp for fool, jam etc. Or makes a nice ice cream.