May oneth - just a day

Today is May oneth, and truly TPP cannot get worked up about the various causes associated with that date. The weather has been quite awful and both gardening and field work has suffered from the windy, coldish, very rainy weather, yet we got off on the light side, no tornadoes or severe winds, inches of rain, but mostly handled by nature (and it helps living on a rise), and no frosts, freezes, or snow.  But grass and lawn weeds have been growing way too well, war will be waged on certain fronts, when the rains stop.  Reading somewhere that today is Loyalty Day in the US, but when our current president says it, it doesn't mean what he wants it to say.  Of some note, over 150 different plants have flowered in our gardens already.  In particular the flowering dogwoods and azaleas have been great. The yellow tree peonies has just started and so missed getting pounded by heavy rains, and that always makes TPP happy.  So TPP remains loyal to plants, to our best freedoms (sorry, but gun freedoms always seem in infringe upon others), and to clean air and water, real basic freedoms, folks. But the absolute, and totally best thing about today was having fresh rhubarb pie for breakfast.

Rhubarb delights

Rhubarb is one of the true delights of spring. It's fairly easy to grow, a dependable, non-fussy perennial.  However it's amazing how many times people say they don't particularly care for rhubarb.  Now as TPP has mentioned before Mrs. Phactor is a very accomplished woman and pie making is one of those accomplishments (here for the record), and rhubarb makes awesomely good pie as long as you don't include strawberries, which don't make good pie. So the point is simple, when you have rhubarb pie for breakfast you've started your day out right. Now as if that wasn't enough, here's part 2 of your rhubarb double header: an Aperol Sour. Actually TPP doesn't know the actual name of this cocktail because he was looking for recipes that used a peculiar ingredient: rhubarb bitters. It happens the Phactors were in a big box liquor store buying a bottle of wine or two for the month and there was a display of bitters, and having previously discovered the value of orange bitters (try them in an Old Fashioned cocktail), Mrs. Phactor loving most things rhubarb bought the rhubarb bitters. That was like 2 years ago, but they have long shelf life apparently. OK, so here's the cocktail: 1 oz gin, 1 oz Aperol, 1 oz lime juice, 2 dashes of rhubarb bitters, and 1/4 to 1/2 oz of simple syrup well shaken with ice and served in a cocktail glass. Aperol is a red Campari like apperitif that uses rhubarb as part of its flavoring. If you like really tart drinks, omit the simple syrup. The lime was very tart, so a touch of simple syrup balanced the cocktail, but this is not a sweety type kiddy cocktail although it does look pink. This would prompt the same reaction as when TPP let his adult nieces and nephews, and even some of their parents, try a Negroni (a Florentine cocktail consisting of 1:1:1 (think ounces) gin, Campari, and sweet Vermouth) built on the rocks. Too bitter, not sweet enough was the general reaction, and then they left TPP's booze alone. Mission accomplished. Hope this pleases my readers. An endorsement for rhubarb pie for breakfast, and if anyone has a kuchen recipe with a rhubarb custard top (found in Switzerland), also eaten for breakfast, do pass it along, TPP has been looking for one, and a nice rhubarby cocktail for sipping in your garden.