Honey Rhubarb Compote with Gingersnap Cookies and Blue Cheese Butter

It’s Rhubarb season so I made Honey Rhubarb Compote with Gingersnap Cookies and Blue Cheese Butter!  Do you want a flavor that goes explode-o in your mouth?  You have to try sweetened rhubarb paired with blue cheese and ginger.  When I first put this delicious Rhubarb snack into my mouth, my eyes popped out of my head and I thought, what is happening in my face right now?

Sour, sweet, spicy, and savory ingredients make for a well-balanced recipe, but the 3 flavors of sweetened rhubarb, ginger, and blue cheese are SO distinctive from one another your mouth goes into shock!  SHOCK MUNCH!

Dude, the tagline on my homepage says recipes so good to munch on they’re shocking.  This Honey Rhubarb Compote with Gingersnap Cookies and Blue Cheese Butter recipe is the epitome of shockingly good.  You take a bite and your mouth goes, what the fuck was that, and how do I get more of it?

Wanna hear something weird?  Last Tuesday was the first time I purchased rhubarb.  A week before that was the first time I tasted it.  I categorized rhubarb with turnips and parsnips, you know, the types of produce only grandmothers like to eat.  You know what I’m talking about, right?  Have you ever gone to your grandmother’s house, and she’s cooking some old-timey shit that only her taste buds are accustom too?  I thought rhubarb would taste like that.  Maybe it’s because my Grandma’s name was Barb?

Anyhow, over the last few months, I’ve heard amazing things about rhubarb so I was dying to try it.  Last week Kieran and I were eating dinner at our favorite food truck pod in SE Portland.  The pod features 15 different food trucks, a beer truck, a double-decker bus that sells vintage wears, and a huge outdoor dining area with several picnic benches and fire pits.

Kieran and I were seated next to a cute couple who were feeding their toddler ramen noodles on a picnic bench.  A random proprietor of a truck came over and handed the husband a little paper cup filled with a purplish jelly substance.

She said, “I heard you love rhubarb so I brought you a leftover sample!”

The husband sincerely thanked her then proceeded to dunk a chunk, hahaha.  I just typed “dunk a chunk!”  Anyway, he dunked a chunk of break into the purplish goo as I sat wide-eyed, staring at him.  He quickly noticed I was staring and asked if everything was ok.

I said in amazement, “Wow, you’re eating rhubarb!”

Husband looking amused, “Yeah!  I can’t believe that woman gave this to me, I LOVE rhubarb.”

I responded, “True confession time, I’ve never tried rhubarb, I wonder if that woman would give me some?!”

Breaking into a grin the husband asked, “Do you want to try some of mine?”

My eyes sprang open like I won the lottery, “Get out of here!  Are you Serious?!?  Are you for REAL??  Is today the day I get to try rhubarb?  TODAY????  Holy shit.”

The husband, stifling a laugh, “Yes of course, please have some.”

The husband tore off a piece of his bread and handed it to me.  I dunked a chunk (hahahahahaha) of bread into the rhubarb sauce, closed my eye in anticipation, and took a bite.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hot damn people, I fucking love rhubarb now.

If you’re looking for a quick and unique appetizer or snack, ladies and gentleman, you’ve found it. Honey Rhubarb Compote with Gingersnap Cookies and Blue Cheese Butter has all the major flavor players I dare you to say major flavor players 5 times real fast a recipe could want.  The honey is sweet, the rhubarb is sour, the blue cheese is earthy and savory, and the gingersnap cookies lend a hint of spice.  It’s flavor perfection in a cute petite snack!

Since rhubarb is overabundantly sour, it’s usually paired with berries and gobs of sugar.  If you Google rhubarb recipes you’ll see oodles of recipes that turn rhubarb into deserts like pies, tarts, cakes, and jellies.  I thought it would be fun to try something different and add savory and spicy flavors to the mix.

Oh shit, before I forget, if you purchase rhubarb from the store, don’t eat the leaves off the purple stalks and kill yourself.  Those leaves are seriously poisonous, throw them away! #publicserviceannouncement

I love this recipe for its simplicity too, it takes roughly a half hour to put the components of the dish together and everything can be made days in advance.  If you’re not feeding a ton of people, you’ll probably have leftover rhubarb compote and blue cheese butter.  Both of these ingredients can be used in countless other recipes so wasting food won’t be an issue.  For example, plan on making steak or burgers a few days after you make this recipe.  Once the steak/burgers are finished cooking, slap a hunk of the blue cheese butter on top of the resting meat, it will melt and give your burgers a rich blue cheese and buttery taste.  The extra rhubarb compote can be used over ice cream or even as a glaze for chicken dishes.  This is the recipe that keeps on giving!

For all you vegans out there.  Some good friends from Chicago came to visit us last weekend who are vegan.  Since Honey Rhubarb Compote with Gingersnap Cookies and Blue Cheese Butter isn’t vegan, I made some adjustments.   I made this recipe before I remembered they were visiting, so I used honey which isn’t vegan.  Fortunately, they made an exception for the honey, but vegans can swap out agave nectar if need be.  I served the Honey Rhubarb Compote with vegan Smoked Gouda Style Block from Daiya and gluten-free crackers they try and avoid gluten when they can too.  The vegan/gluten-free options worked exceptionally well, my friends gave the Rhubarb snack a big thumbs up.

So the next time you’re thinking about making rhubarb into a pie or tart, slap that tasty son of a bitch on gingersnap cookies smeared with blue cheese butter and enjoy this interestingly good, tasty snack, instead!

Thanks for stopping by,

Christina

3-4 stalks of rhubarb, cleaned and cut up into chunks like celery. *THROW out the leaves – 44 (roughly 11 calories per stalk)
1/4 cup water – 0
1-pint raspberries – 162
1-2 tablespoons of honey – 128
2 oz of soft, spreadable blue cheese – 200
1/4 cup of butter – 407
Mi-Del Gingersnap cookies (per cookie) – 28

Total – 562

It’s hard to give an accurate count on the calories because it depends on how much of each ingredient you use on the gingersnap cookies, and I had an ample amount of blue cheese butter and honey rhubarb compote leftover.  Let’s just say you have 15 cookies, and you use up ALL the ingredients equally on each, that comes to 38 calories per serving.  Use the total as a guideline if you’re counting calories.  Don’t forget to add additional calories if you add honey (to taste) to your butter blue cheese mixture.

*Note, I am not a nutritionist, nor am I pretending to be. I found the calorie counts by reading the nutrition labels on the food I purchased, searching Google, and using my Lose It! app on my phone.using my Lose It! app on my phone.