Lil Ms Squirrel's Rhubarb Fool

There was a recent episode of The Apprentice where some of the supposed finest young minds of modern Britain spent ages coming up with a new product to market, only for one of them to announce "Actually, we've just created the bin."  I felt a bit like this tonight as I set about trying to make a healthier version of James Martin's rhubarb fool and finally realising that I've just about made low fat rhubarb and custard.

Healthier than it looks

Admittedly I've never eaten rhubarb and custard before so it's new to me.  But I missed the obvious whilst going to so much effort.

James' recipe combines ready made custard with whipped cream.  Because I was looking for something lower in fat, I decided to combine my homemade custard (made using skimmed milk) with Greek yogurt.  Having done a little research on the best way to poach rhubarb, I settled on a method from Dan Lepard where you roast the rhubarb with a little sugar.  He rightly points out that poaching it in a pan can leave it watery.  I love his method because you get a thick, tasty syrup in the bottom of the dish.  Trouble is, it's so tempting just to lick the bowl clean.

Because my rhubarb was quite mature, rather than the thin pink rhubarb you get earlier in the year, I left it in whole chunks and layered it with the custard mixture and crushed amaretti biscuits.

It was an okay pudding for someone looking for a healthy, diet friendly pudding to combat a bout of hormonal sugar craving.  And I have the rest of the lovely roasted rhubarb to eat with my breakfast yogurt tomorrow.

Unfortunately for my diet, it's now reminded me that this lovely recipe from Sadia from the Baking Elements blog is still on my to-do-list.  I think my work colleagues are in for a lucky week next week.

Here's what I did.  It's a bit faffy, so you could substitute the homemade custard for a small pot of low fat, ready made custard for speed.

Recipe - Serves 2

For the custard mixture

• 1 medium egg yolk
• 2 tsp cornflour
• 2 tsp sugar
• 200ml skimmed milk
• 1/4 tsp vanilla extract
• 3 tbsp low fat Greek yogurt

For the rhubarb

• 400g rhubarb, cut into two inch chunks
• 75g caster sugar
• juice of 1/2 lemon

To assemble

• 4 amaretti biscuits, crushed
• 2 small glass tumblers

1. Preheat the oven to 170c/150c (fan).  Place the rhubarb in a shallow glass dish, sprinkle over the sugar and lemon juice.  Roast for an hour.  Leave to cool.
2. Mix the egg yolk and cornflour together in a bowl.  Heat the milk to boiling point then pour over the egg mixture, whisking quickly.  Pour back into the pan and heat until thickened.  Beat in the sugar and leave to cool.
3. To assemble put a few pieces of rhubarb into the bottom of each glass.  Add a tablespoon of custard and sprinkle with some of the biscuits.  Repeat the layering, finishing with a layer of biscuits.