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Barry Swanson, professor of food science, and I see eye to eye
on at least one significant issue. We like our rhubarb pie to be
made exclusively with rhubarb. NOT strawberries. Just rhubarb.
However, Swanson actually prefers his rhubarb as sauce, over ice
cream. Although Swanson does no research on the tart vegetable, he
is an avid enthusiast and considers it an acidic parallel to his
work with cranberries. And obviously, given his rhubarb enthusiasm,
Swanson is from the Midwest, where every old farmstead has a
rhubarb patch. “Mom always made rhubarb pie in the spring,” he
says.
Rhubarb is also known by Midwesterners as a spring tonic, a
purgative. In other words, a laxative, says Swanson.
In fact, the use of rhubarb as food is relatively recent. But it
goes way back as a medicinal, particularly in China. Rhubarb was
first mentioned, as a purgative and stomachic, in the Chinese
herbal Pen-King, which is believed to date from 2700
B.C.
Medicinal use, however, was generally limited to the roots.
Rhubarb found its way to Europe by way of Turkey and Russia. It was
first planted in England in 1777 by an apothecary named Hayward.
Someone obviously decided to try the stems, found they were great
with substantial amounts of sugar, and rhubarb thus joined our
culinary heritage.
Many of the 60 accessions of rhubarb maintained by the Western
Regional Plant Introduction Station here at Washington State
University are medicinal, says collection curator Barbara Hellier
(’00 M.S.). The WRPIS is one of four plant introduction stations in
the USDA-ARS National Plant Germplasm System, which is responsible
for collecting and maintaining seed and clonal germplasm. The
station here actually maintains the backup collection, the main
collection being in Palmer, Alaska.
Hellier says those 60 accessions represent a pretty good
selection of the world’s rhubarb cultivars, though the selection of
species within the genus could benefit from further collecting.
Washington is the largest producer of rhubarb in the nation,
with most of it grown around Sumner. When I spoke with him in late
February, Tim Laughlin, the sales manager for the Washington
Rhubarb Growers Association, said the growers were sending out
1,500 15-pound cases of hothouse rhubarb a week. Outside field
season runs from March to September, resulting in about 65,000
20-pound boxes. Although some Washington rhubarb is sent frozen to
Japan, most is sold domestically, fresh for household consumption
and frozen for restaurants.
Although the climate of Sumner is apparently ideal for rhubarb,
the variety grown there, Red Crimson, adds greatly to the crop’s
quality. Laughlin said a Michigan grower recently tried to buy
some, but the cooperative’s farmers wouldn’t sell any for less than
$200 a bulb.
With a pH of around 3.1, rhubarb is not quite as tart as one
might think from chewing on a raw stalk (a lemon is about 2.0). It
just doesn’t have any sugar to balance out the acidity. Try
substituting it for other acidic ingredients. (I’m working on a
rhubarb-chipotle barbecue sauce.) However, as Swanson insists,
rhubarb is best at its simplest. Just chop some up and heat with a
little water and sugar to taste, which will be quite a bit. Pour
the sauce over your favorite ice cream.
If you Google the WSU Web site for rhubarb, you’ll turn up lots
of good rhubarb recipes, generally in spring editions of Extension
newsletters.
By the way, don’t eat the leaves. With high levels of oxalates
and, probably, anthraquinone glycosides, they are toxic. Swanson
says you’d have to eat a lot to do any harm. But why bother, when
you’ve got the stalks?
--Tim Steury
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