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Buying fruit and vegetables during their natural season typically rewards you with the best flavour and quality, with natural light serving to sweeten and aid the growth of the pant. Forced rhubarb is the exception, with it’s pink, tender stems, an altogether sweeter prospect than the tough, outdoor reared variety available from April.
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The life of the forced rhubarb plant is quite spectacular. It spends two years in the fields of
Yorkshire’s ‘Rhubarb Triangle’, storing carbohydrates before being transferred into dark warm sheds where the primed shoots will frantically search for light. Forget oranges and lemons, forced rhubarb can compete in terms of beauty and tartness, subtle flavour and texture - a welcome ray of light during a relatively bleak time for fresh British produce. Other than being merely delicious, Rhubarb is now also classified as a super food due to its low calorific value; it has high levels of Calcium meaning other more cholesterol heavy means of calcium delivery such as dairy products can be avoided.
But what to do with it? Stewed, rhubarb marries beautifully with yoghurt, ice-cream and cream. Stewing rhubarb, providing one can resist the urge to use too much liquid, is very easy. Poaching it in orange juice rather than with water can mean less sugar is needed. A low heat will also mean it retains its structural integrity, although if cooked to a mush the flavour will be unaffected and it can be made into a fool.
Vanilla and ginger also make happy bed fellows. In recent times it has enjoyed resurgence in use as a savoury ingredient and many chefs espouse its use with fatty meats and oily fish. Pork and rhubarb is a match made in heaven, it also works nicely with rabbit, duck, mackerel and tuna. So give it a go, experiment with pies, crumbles, preserves, chutneys and enjoy it whilst it is in season. If you are not much of a cook try it dipped in sugar, it is much healthier than Haribo!