Rhubarb’s Bold Stalk

It’s spring and I have a yen for my favorite tonic.

“The first rhubarb of the season is to the digestive tract of winter-logged inner man what a good hot bath with plenty of healing soap is to the outer,” wrote Della Lutes nearly 50 years ago in “The Country Kitchen.”

Why, please tell me, does the word rhubarb make some people cross their eyes? When it’s the right cultivar, perfectly cooked and delectably seasoned, rhubarb is brilliantly rosy, tangy and fruity-sweet, a beautiful tonic for the body and the spirit.

Is rhubarb valuable nutritionally? Despite its ancient reputation from Europe to China as a tonic, these days it’s considered equivalent to pears. But a while ago, who knew about the astonishing value of cauliflower? As we’ve all heard, the crucial thing in a healthy diet is a rich variety of fruits and vegetables. I’m not asking you to make rhubarb a mainstay. Just make it a friend.

What’s the right kind of rhubarb? Until a few years ago, much of the rhubarb offered was either the old-time variety Victoria, whose stalks are greenish, or MacDonald, whose stalks are reddish but can turn brownish in hot weather. Remember, you want to bring shocking-pink stalks into the kitchen, stalks that will hold their color in cooking. At the market, choose the brightest, slenderest, perkiest stalks in the bin. For growing, I recommend Valentine or Chipman’s Canada Red.

I’ve only just discovered what I think is the best way to cook rhubarb: Poach it in a light syrup. In culinary terms, this is a rhubarb compote.

Bring a mixture of twice as much water as sugar to a boil in a nonreactive skillet and stir over brisk heat until the sugar dissolves. Add a little orange or lemon zest and juice (the acid preserves rhubarb’s red and accentuates its flavor). Lay in half-inch chunks of rhubarb--no more than the syrup will cover (figure about 1 1/2 cups of sugar for the syrup to every five cups of rhubarb). Simmer uncovered until tender, seven to eight minutes.

The rhubarb will be soft but not mushy, its color and flavor crystalline. Refrigerate until cold. You’ll probably have too much syrup, so strain the mixture over a bowl. Refrigerate or freeze the scarlet sweet-tart syrup and use for poaching apricots and peaches when they’re in season. Use the syrup again and again until it’s gone.

To use a minimum of sugar, first stew rhubarb until tender in a little orange juice, then sweeten with sweet fruit. Strawberries are classic.

Inch-size pieces of rhubarb freeze exceptionally well. Drop into boiling water for one minute, scoop out and drop into ice water for one minute, then drain and quickly freeze. Later, thaw and cook with raspberries and plums in season, adding their pretty sweetenings.

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I think every kitchen garden should have its “pie plant.” That’s what it’s called in rhubarb-appreciating parts of the country. Rhubarb makes a great pie. Cut into half-inch pieces to make four cups, dredge with a heaping cup of sugar and one-quarter cup of flour, and sprinkle with ground ginger or mix in chopped candied ginger to taste. A handful of seeded Muscat raisins give a turn-of-the-century flavor. Add flakes of butter, cover with a lid and bake as usual.

A less-caloric rhubarb dessert is to turn the sugared pieces into a shallow buttered baking dish. Cover with fine dried bread crumbs, sprinkle with sugar to taste and dot with butter. Bake in a moderate oven until the crumbs are browned and the rhubarb is soft, 45 to 50 minutes. Serve warm with cream or ice cream.

Rhubarb fool--cooked sweetened rhubarb folded with the same measure of whipped cream--may just be the best of all. For a slimmer (though not nearly as comforting) version, substitute vanilla nonfat yogurt for the whipped cream.

Just as applesauce is a delicious companion to pork, rhubarb sauce is divine served in a small dish with cold white meats, especially chicken. Another way with rhubarb and meats is to turn it into a chutney: Mix in white raisins, lemon, garlic and fresh ginger to taste and balance the flavors with vinegar and sugar. Cook slowly until thick, process in a kettle or refrigerate. Then keep a few weeks before serving.

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I should explain why we were buying rhubarb. Our garden is in the mountains, and until a few weeks ago, the earth around our rhubarb was glazed every morning. Our Valentine’s green leaves are just poking up through the earth. It will be a long month before we can harvest the first crop.

Rhubarb is a joyous plant for the garden. With its enormous crinkled, heart-shaped green leaves and ruby stalks it’s superbly ornamental.

It’s at once easy to grow and demanding. Like many perennials (plants that are long-lived), rhubarb needs a rest each year. This starts when the stalks and leaves wizen and fall off in the autumn cold. If your winters are consistently above 40 degrees, the plant will keep growing, and there won’t be any tender new stalks in spring, just lots of big tough ones.

So in balmy climates, grow rhubarb as an annual. If you plant several crowns in very early spring and water well, you’ll have some first-rate pies before you pull up the plants come winter.

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In the high desert, plant crowns in the fall, then harvest in spring. Rhubarb doesn’t prosper in great heat, so you’ll have to pull up plants in the desert summer.

Although rhubarb is cooked as a fruit, it’s not one in the botanical sense. The edible part is a stem, not a fleshy, seed-containing structure. You can start rhubarb from seeds, but it’s faster and surer to start from a crown, also known as a root division--a base of a plant with roots divided from an existing plant.

To make rhubarb happy, dig a generous hole in well-drained soil in full sun. Mix in as much compost or well-aged manure as you can spare. Give lots of water and keep the soil moist ever after. Mulch deeply with manure spring and autumn.

If you’re growing it as a perennial, like asparagus, you must let plants gain strength before you start taking parts away. Don’t harvest until one year from the time of planting. Snap off the stalk at the base--cutting with a knife invites disease--and never harvest more than one-fourth of the whole plant. The first year, harvest for about one month. After that, harvest for a couple of months or until the emerging stalks are noticeably puny.

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Rhubarb is gorgeous in a big container. The only trouble with the magnificent leaves is that they’re very poisonous! It’s interesting that botanists aren’t sure of the nature of the poison quite yet.

By the way, rhubarb’s main element in terms of nutrition is calcium--it contains a fair amount. But the body can’t use it. That’s because the stuff that makes rhubarb tart is oxalic acid--the same ingredient that makes sorrel and spinach tart. Oxalic acid behaves curiously. Somehow it locks up the calcium in a way that makes it impossible for the body to absorb it. I have no doubt that one day, we’ll be told to eat this food or take that tablet with rhubarb/sorrel/spinach and the calcium will flow forth.

Then, in the vernacular of the bumper sticker, have you hugged your rhubarb today?

Sources:

Fresh, at the market.

Order jumbo-size root divisions from Henry Field’s Seed & Nursery Co., 415 N. Burnett, Shenandoah, Iowa 51602.