Semolina Budino with Rhubarb and Mint Marmellata

The baby wait is finally over! Our daughter, Dublin Rose, was born on May 3 at 1:10 in the afternoon after a very long labor. She's beautiful, healthy, and making sure that her parents aren't getting much sleep. She also managed to be two weeks late and ended up being born on my wife and I's anniversary. Its a very nice surprise considering that I too was born two weeks late and on my parents anniversary back in 1979! What are the astronomical odds of that?

I planned to post a picture of her sooner but as you can imagine there was a lot going on. Regardless, she's settled in at home and I'm back with cookbook in hand and ready to cook. 

It's a great time to be cooking here in Holyoke as we have finally entered rhubarb season. I missed it by just a few weeks last year, so I wanted to make sure that some stalks came home with me this time around. I've been wanting to try this next recipe since I bought the book. 

Budino is the Italian word for custard or pudding. They are popping up more often on trendy Italian restaurant menus across the country. Mario adds semolina to this one, a type of flour, which I think will change the texture slightly and firm it up to where the budino can free stand on its own. Let's get started. 

There is an omission as to what the oven should be preheated to so we have to assume 350°. I take some more of those handy foil ramekins, butter them, and dust them with sugar. 

In a small sauce pan I add sliced rhubarb, sugar, and a vanilla bean and cook it over medium heat until the rhubarb is tender. 

This mixture needs to cool and as it does I start the budino batter. I use the kitchen aid mixer and beat egg yolks and sugar until they are a very pale yellow. 

Vanilla extract, melted butted, and milk are then added. 

Next up, semolina and cake flour is added. 

The cooled rhubarb is ready to be folded into the batter along with whipped egg whites. 

The batter can now be portioned into the ramekins and put into a baking dish with water that goes up to about 2/3 of the height of the ramekins. The pan gets covered in foil and the budini are baked for about 25 minutes, and additionally up to 10 minutes uncovered until they are set in the middle. I found that 25 minutes was plenty of time in my oven but you making this at home may need the additional time that Mario suggests. 

While the budini are baking, I use the rest of the rhubarb to make the marmellata. In a sauce pan I add finely diced rhubarb, sugar, vanilla bean, and mint, and cook it down slowly for about 10 minutes until tender yet still able to maintain its shape. This too gets cooled completely. 

Finally I'm ready to plate. I wanna try this like right now! The smell in my kitchen is intoxicating. I run a pairing knife around the edge of the budino and put it on the plate, along with a copious amount of the marmellata and some whipped cream. 

The plating is classic Babbo. Simple yet elegant. My wife and I dove into these hardcore! This dessert really lets you know that spring is here. My wife declared this to be her favorite dessert so far. We took some over to my in-laws, because it's hard for us to eat all of the yield, and they too thought that this was a home run. It's just sweet enough without over doing it. I'm glad that I got to make this it was worth the wait. 

The local farmers market has just opened and I'll be checking it out weekly to see what is special that I can bring home. They usually have some great stuff to choose from. It's even on my day off. 

I still haven't quite got around to tilling out my space for my garden yet but I plan to tackle that next Monday. As you can see below, my seedlings are ready for a bigger home. This year I plan on building raised beds to keep everything more organized and looking better, but I'll keep you posted. 

Well the break is over. Back to bottle making, laundry, and holding my precious newborn. Until next time...