Chewy rhubarb and stem ginger cookies

And on struggling to come up with recipes

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Can I take you back to a January day a few years ago? I’d been writing my recipe column for five years or so. Sometimes sitting down to write it felt like I had exhausted all the possibilities of an ingredient. Rhubarb was one.

As a recipe columnist (especially one who focuses on veg) you’ll be expected to hit all the food moments of the year, Mother's Day, Christmas, and asparagus season etc and while I loved being part of those moments in people's kitchens there were weeks when I felt a bit stumped.

Not because I’d run out of steam, obviously the world of cooking is almost endless and there is always a new take. But because I felt I’d already shared the recipes I genuinely cook with those ingredients and coming up with anything new, well, it felt a bit fake. I want the recipes I put in your hands to be the ones that are cooked in my kitchen, again and again - not just something I’ve come up with to meet a deadline or to please an editor.

That day I sat down to an empty screen next to a bundle of forced rhubarb and my mind was blank. I wanted to use rhubarb in a way I’d never thought of before but also in a way I knew I would repeat. A few hours later these cookies came out of the oven and I was pleased with myself. I think the word is smug.

A craving for a chewy American cookie and the sharpness of rhubarb, all at once, led to these. The sweet-tart stick of rock pink of rhubarb, but in a cookie, with stem ginger and white choc. These have become one of my most beloved recipes.

By the way, very few recipes come so easily, my record is 35 tests of an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to recreate a grape cake I’d had in Italy.

This recipe was published in my column on the 27th March 2020, there was another small inconsequential global event happening then which meant this recipe did not get its time in the sun. When I wrote this recipe it was a combination I’d not seen before, these seem to be a few versions out there now but to me, this was the first.

The cookies use white chocolate, very out of character for me. I think this is the only recipe I have ever written with white chocolate. It's not something I love to eat on its own but here it works as the sweetness of the white choc is needed next to the sourness of the rhubarb.

We are moving from sweet shop pink forced rhubarb season to the pink and green-tinged field-grown rhubarb. I love the pink stuff for its colour but the field grown is just as good, if not as fluro, so use what you can get.

These also feature my ingredient of the moment, stem ginger. I just can't stop using it. It's such a good thing to have in your cupboard, it lasts for ages and is always there to give your cakes, cookies and fruit a little extra punch.

If you can’t find it then a small thumb of grated ginger in the batter will do the trick. The stem ginger book is writing itself, it’s going to sell about 10 copies.

There are oats here as I love a little texture in my cookies, there are no eggs and no butter but instead oil which makes for a very easy (and vegan) cookie dough.

Here is a little video of me cooking these from my parents shed in real-time during the days when life was weird and upside down and we did that kind of thing.

Sometimes good ideas come from feeling like you’ve hit a wall. A good thing to remind myself and a promise to you to continue to keep only sharing the recipes with you that are loved and repeated in my kitchen.

Chewy white chocolate, stem ginger and rhubarb cookies

If you are vegan make sure to use a vegan white chocolate as the rest of the recipe is vegan.

Prep 15 min
Chill 30 min
Cook 35 min

Makes 14-16

2 sticks of rhubarb (about 180g), cut into 1cm pieces
150g plain flour
50g porridge oats
¾ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
½ teaspoon fine salt
150g golden caster sugar
125g white chocolate, roughly chopped
2 balls of stem ginger, roughly chopped
85ml sunflower or vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla bean paste (or ½ teaspoon vanilla extract)

Put the cut rhubarb on to a lined baking tray and then put in the oven, turning it to 190C (180C fan)/390F/gas 6. As the oven slowly comes up to temperature, it will start to draw out the moisture from the rhubarb (while keeping some of that vibrant pink colour). Bake for 20 minutes while you prep the cookie dough, then set aside to cool.

Line two large oven trays with baking paper, and start on the cookie dough. Put the 150g of plain flour, 50g of oats, ¾ teaspoon of baking powder, ½ a teaspoon of bicarb, ½ a teaspoon of salt and 150g of caster sugar in a large bowl and mix well with a whisk (this stops the baking powder and bicarb from clumping). Add the 125g of chopped white chocolate and chopped stem ginger.

In another bowl, whisk the 85ml oil, 2 teaspoons vanilla paste. Pour the liquid mixture into the dry ingredients, stir vigorously with a wooden spoon until the mixture comes together into a batter, and pop the bowl in the fridge to chill for at least 30 minutes.

By this time, the rhubarb should be cool; add half of it to the chilled dough, loosely stirring to mix it through. Scoop out the mixture one tablespoon at a time, then gently roll the dough in your hands into balls about the size of a golf ball. Put the raw cookies on to a baking tray, leaving about 10cm between each, so they can spread out while cooking. Gently push them down to flatten them to thick discs and pop a little extra rhubarb on top.

Bake for 12-15 minutes, or until the cookies have a crisp, golden edge and are not wobbly to the touch in the centre. Leave to cool completely on the trays before eating.

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