Our first rhubarb of the year

Our rhubarb is doing well. We planted two roots back at the end of winter in the hope of starting a little rhubarb patch behind the chicken run where we don’t get so much sun, and it seems to be paying off. One of the plants looks big and healthy and the other, after a bit of hesitation, is starting to catch it up.

But we’re cheating a bit here. We won’t get any real fruit from either of them this year – they’re just getting themselves settled down – so when I saw six huge stalks of rhubarb on the market for £1 I couldn’t resist. They tipped the scales at almost a kilo, so when you compare that price with what you’d have to pay in the supermarket they were a veritable bargain.

I decided to stew them for a crumble by adding three tablespoonfuls of water, a teaspoonful of ginger and 70g of brown sugar, as most of the online sources seem to recommend, then put them over a low heat until most of the rhubarb lost its structure, leaving just a few good chunks among them for texture.

Sadly it boils down quite efficiently and by the end we had enough for a crumble for three, which I’ve frozen, plus a small container over which I’ve been spooning into our homemade yoghurt. It is fantastic. Easily the best yoghurt flavour we’ve yet tried, and enough to make me a bit annoyed that I have frozen so much of the fruit. I could defrost it and use it all this way, I suppose, but I am really looking forward to a crumble before too long.

Rhubarb dilemma.

Either way, if I see any more on the market next week I’ll be buying some.

Stewed rhubarb

Related posts:

1. The rhubarb is shooting
2. We’ve planted some rhubarb
3. We bag some bargain rhubarb for the garden
4. A surprise showing from the ‘dead’ rhubarb
5. A year on the plot: another five highlights

Tagged as: fruit, rhubarb, vegetables