Rhubarb rhubarb

I thought I'd written before about the wonders of rhubarb, but there's no label for it so I can't have. It's one of the best things to buy right now, and last weekend, when I got back from a trip to Auckland (where I had rhubarb crumble), I found a beautiful bunch of slender deep red sticks at my local. I had friends comiing to stay to see Sirocco (more about him coming up on Elsewoman), and I knew I'd seen a rhubarb cake recipe somewhere in my Lois Daish folder. I reckon it's the best cake I've made this year.

Rhubarb and ginger cake (Lois Daish, Listener, 10 October 1998)

450g rhubarb (I had a bit less so I put in pieces of firm fresh pear as well - it worked perfectly)
1 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1 and 1/4 cups plain flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 cup cooking oil (sunflower, safflower - I used canola)
1 egg
1/2 cup roughly chopped crystallised ginger
icing sugar for dusting

>Preheat oven to 180C. Line base of a ring tin with baking paper and lightly oil the sides. (I used a square one - it doesn't rise a lot but it makes nice square slices.)
>Wash and trim rhubarb and cut into 1cm lengths. Mix with the brown sugar and let stand for 15 minutes.

>Sift flour, baking soda and ginger into a large bowl.

>In a small bowl, beat the egg with the oil to mix and pour into the rhubarb and sugar. Add the crystallised ginger and mix well.
>Tip rhubarb mixture into the bowl of flour and stir carefully to combine. (This mixture is quite wet, but don't worry, it's fine.)
>Spread mixture in the cake tin, smoothing the top with the back of a spoon. (At this point I placed some extra, thin square slices of ginger on top.)

>Bake for 60-75 minutes until top is well browned and springy to touch. Cool in the tin before turning out. Dust icing sugar thickly over the top before serving. (I forgot to do this, never mind.)

We ate it for afternoon tea, and again for a late dessert when we got back from seeing Sirocco. With it we had Clearwater cream-top yoghurt with honey. Oh yes.