Rhubarb

I ate some raspberries yesterday. Five or six of them balanced on top of the most exquisite galette-style biscuit that was smeared with an intensely vanillary creme patissiere. A dark chocolate web of ganache on top of the berries was literally the icing on the cake. The amazing thing was not how good the whole thing tasted together - the cakes at Clapham's Macaron are always wonderful - but how tasty those framboises were. So juicy and flavourful and ripe. Heaven knows where they got them at this time of year. They were the exact opposite of the hard, tasteless berries than spoil those Valentine's desserts.

What's that got to do with rhubarb? Well, normally February is when the red fruit lover can normally first get a fix. A hint that the fruit desert of winter will go eventually and the wild larder will be filled with juicy red flavours again. Only it comes in the form of thin sticks of light deprived forced rhubarb. Snap one and sniff. It's all strawberry, raspberry and citrus, like a young, simple red Burgundy from Marsannay or Fixin. The aromas seem to have nothing in common with the bendy stalks or the yellowing leaves. There's just too much zest and life in that smell.

The rhubarb cost a fortune (when will I learn not to shop at the greengrocer's in Primrose Hill?) but stewed gently to a pulp with some orange juice and ginger, it will lift the spirits at breakfast this week. Stirred into some creamy yoghurt or just plain in a bowl, jolting the senses awake with its tart conversation.