Rhubarb and Custard Fool with Cardamom Sablé Soldiers

BIANCA
Fie! what a foolish duty call you this?
LUCENTIO
I would your duty were as foolish too:
The wisdom of your duty, fair Bianca,
Hath cost me an hundred crowns since supper-time.
BIANCA
The more fool you, for laying on my duty.
PETRUCHIO
Katharina, I charge thee, tell these headstrong women
What duty they do owe their lords and husbands.

THE TAMING OF THE SHRES ACT 5, SCENE 2 – WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Fooling around in two different ways

This won’t cost you a hundred crowns before or after supper-time. It’s pushing the limits of fool-ish ness as it doesn’t include cream, but I’m not a huge fan of whipped cream so I’ve used Total Greek Yoghurt and custard powder. There’s a school of thought that says that “fool” comes from the French word fouler meaning to crush, so it qualifies because it has crushed fruit in it. That said, apparently the this is “dismissed by the Oxford English Dictionary as baseless and inconsistent with the early use of the word”. So hey, who knows.

Breakfast Fool

You can either eat this for breakfast with muesli, put it in a pot for a picnic (yoghurt keeps better than cream), or make the sable soldiers and dunk them for a back-garden summer’s evening dessert.

See this month’s Rangemaster blog post for the full recipe.

Serves 2

For the fool:
1 can rhubarb in light syrup (450g)
1 handful frozen berries
half a large pot of greek yoghurt (any fat content is fine)
6 tsbsp custard powder

Pudding version – with cardamom sablé soldiers:
100g caster sugar
6 cardamom pod
1oog cold butter cut into small cubes.
150g plain flour
1 egg

Breakfast version:
handful of granola or muesli

Dunking Fool