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["Toni Hawryluk" <tonihawr AT msn.com>]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6000443/

 

Rhubarb hunts a place beyond the pie

A sidelined crop recasts itself in the modern world

 

By Jon Bonné

MSNBC

Updated: 9:10 p.m. ET Sept. 17, 2004

 

ORTING, Wash. - For rhubarb lovers, walking the rows of Allen Scholz's farm 
can be torture. Everywhere you look, beautiful pink-red stalks of this 
underappreciated plant have been cut down and simply lie in the dirt, ready 
to be tossed away.

 

Most are fine specimens with just a minor nick or scratch. They would make a 
perfect pie or jam. No matter. Modern rhubarb buyers demand pristine plants; 
even a tiny imperfection won't do.  Scholz discards half his crop before it 
leaves his farm. 

 

"They're absorbing the cost right out in the field," says Cindy Moore, 
manager for the Washington Rhubarb Growers Association, a farmers' co-op and 
one of the few remaining defenders of the vegetable (yes, it's a vegetable). 
"Talk to any of these guys. It'll break their hearts."

 

These are grim times for what remains of the nation's rhubarb industry.  
Certainly, there is no animus towards the stuff. When people think about it 
at all, rhubarb hastens nostalgia -- fond memories of summer pies, the sort 
Grandma might have made. In some corners, it is simply called "the pie plant."

 

That's just the problem.  With modern agriculture's razor-thin margins, 
commodity produce is a starkly competitive business, and rhubarb is not a 
plant that easily makes a case for itself. Nor does its stalky, fibrous 
consistency make for an easy ingredient in a world devoted to fast food and 
microwaves.

 

"Rhubarb just doesn't lend itself real well to that kind of cuisine," says R. 
Allen Straw, a University of Tennessee extension vegetable specialist who has 
written on how to grow the stalks in his state's warmer, moister climate.

 

A tiny crop


Just 1,809 acres are planted across the United States, according to the 2002 
U.S. agricultural census, though that is surely augmented by the backyard 
patches.

 

Washington is the biggest rhubarb growing state, with 824 acres. The growers 
association controls 349 acres, half the size of its crop just 30 years ago. 
Nationally, rhubarb is trumped by okra, turnip greens and even escarole. In 
many areas of the nation, it can be difficult to find at all.

 

"I don't know that I've ever seen it in a chain grocery store," Straw says.

 

All of which seems a shame to the few Northwest farmers still trying to grow 
it, including Scholz, whose 14 acres -- nearly 1 percent of the national crop 
-- make him a notable man in the rhubarb world.

 

The cool, moderate climate and rich soils west of the Cascade Mountains -- in 
places like the Auburn Valley, 40 miles south of Seattle, where Scholz's farm 
is found -- are the perfect growing climate for rhubarb, thought to be native 
to Siberia and central Asia, with one medicinal variety recorded in ancient 
China.

 

"This stuff grows like a weed here," Scholz says. "It used to be a giant 
industry."

 

Rhubarb's bad rap


Rhubarb has long suffered from a largely undeserved reputation for being 
difficult. A comparatively high content of malic and oxalic acids contribute 
to a sour, astringent taste, often so strong that it needs to be combined 
with a sweetening agent. It can have a pH as low as 3, as acidic as some 
vinegar.

 

The oxalic acid, found in cleaning agents, was also long blamed for the 
presumed toxicity of rhubarb leaves, though it is not clear exactly what in 
the leaves causes the adverse reaction. (You would need to eat over 10 pounds 
of leaves to ingest a fatal dose of oxalic acid.) In any case, you won't find 
rhubarb sold with the leaves still on. Scholz's workers hack them off 
immediately after removing stalk from root.

 

In its World War II heyday, when it substituted for less available 
vegetables, rhubarb had at least a notable following. That has tapered off by 
as much as 90 percent. Even high-quality domestic rhubarb faces pressure from 
imports, notably from Poland. 

 

While consumers will pay extra for some high-quality produce, like tomatoes, 
there aren't many discriminating shoppers looking for heirloom rhubarb. Major 
retailers like Wal-Mart, keen to find the lowest wholesale price, have become 
less reliant on domestic sources. 

 

There are still bright spots, like frozen rhubarb, often sold in pre-cut 
chunks. The Washington growers freeze 1.5 million pounds annually, over half 
the 2.6 million pounds of domestic rhubarb shipped each year. Some 60,000 
20-pound cases of fresh rhubarb still make it as far as Texas, New York and 
Florida.

 

The farmers have stretched their growing season, harvesting in successive 
waves from March through September, plus a winter hothouse crop of delicate 
light-pink stalks, popular with fancy chefs, which commands higher prices. 
They sell another 15,000-20,000 cases of the hothouse annually.

 

'A lot of pie'


Their association has been spending its scarce marketing money on a modest 
campaign that aims to educate a younger breed of consumers about the stalk's 
potential. "They have the old myth of Grandma's rhubarb pie, which we all 
love," says Moore, who lost 74 pounds on a rhubarb-heavy low-carb diet, "but 
Grandma's not baking anymore."

 

Perhaps she still is. The intrepid bakers of Aledo, Ill., manage to turn out 
14,000 pies for the two-day Rhubarb Fest, held in early June. "That's a lot 
of pie," says Darlene Johnson, founder of Aledo's annual festival.

 

One of at least six rhubarb festivals held around the world, Johnson launched 
Aledo's celebration of the stalk in 1990, with just 13 dishes and 65 people. 
It now draws nearly 10,000 people from a half-dozen surrounding states to 
this town of 3,600 near the Iowa border.

 

They feast not simply on pies but on meatballs slathered with rhubarb 
barbeque sauce, with rhubarb ice cream for dessert.  Rhubarb wine and tea 
fill cups.

 

"There's no limit," says Johnson. "Every year, everybody scratches to come up 
with a new recipe."

 

Innovation extends to the nation's finer kitchens. At New York's Veritas, 
diners can tuck into seared foie gras with rhubarb confit for an additional 
$8 above the $68 tasting menu. Executive chef Scott Bryan likes the way its 
extremely sour, savory notes punch up seafood.

 

"I love rhubarb," he says. "It's not a difficult ingredient to work with. I 
just think that, you know what, a lot people don't have a lot of experience 
with it, so you don't see it."

 

Rhubarb growers hope to overcome that. New recipe booklets include items like 
rhubarb pico de gallo. There are hints that Ben & Jerry's and suppliers for 
Williams-Sonoma may be planning rhubarb delicacies.

 

As though rhubarb's fight for recognition weren't enough, its diverse color 
scheme has prompted an apparently heated bicoastal rivalry. East Coast 
growers use varieties with greener stalks, and praise their tangy virtues, 
while the West Coast supplies varieties like Crimson Red often sought out by 
intrepid pie types.

 

Hope in a pale plant


One such pie maker is Theresa Millang, author of "The Joy of Rhubarb" 
(Adventure Publications), though she finds little difference in varietal 
flavors. She, too, awaits rhubarb's marketing makeover, and hints that those 
who have been frightened off, à la Brussels sprouts, should expand their 
culinary horizons: "It's just a very good thing, as Martha would say." (As in 
Stewart, whose baking books don't skimp on rhubarb options.)

 

Hothouse rhubarb's subtler flavors, and ghostly pink stalks, are a brave new 
face for the plant. The plants, from a proprietary variety called Johnson 
Red, begin their lives outside, where stalks can grow nearly three feet high. 
In the fall, they are transplanted into bins and hauled inside, tended in 
complete darkness. Without nutrients, the hearty roots drive all their energy 
into the stalks, vainly trying to find sunlight. "It just grows itself to 
death," Scholz says.

 

These specialty stalks may be growers' best bet as the modern world 
encroaches. Facing a hike in property taxes, one of the Washington co-op's 
most prolific growers recently gave up his farm as a Costco warehouse moved 
in. Scholz has diversified into berries.

 

Standing in Scholz's field, "Rhubarb Ruben" Sandberg, who has tended to the 
valley's stalks since 1962, points around at the hearty green leaves and 
crimson stalks. "10 years? This'll all be gone," he scowls.

 

Rhubarb juice

1-2 lbs. rhubarb (or as desired)
1 cup sugar (more as needed)
Canning jars 

 

Boil water in a large pot to sterilize jars. Cut rhubarb into small pieces 
and place in saucepan. Add just enough water to cover and simmer until soft. 
Strain the juice through a jelly bag or cheesecloth. Return to pan, and for 
each quart of juice add one cup sugar and heat until dissolved. Skim and 
bring to a boiling point. Pour into sterilized jars and seal.

 

Rhubarb pico de gallo


About 4 cups 

1 cup diced rhubarb
1 cup diced tomatoes
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup diced white onions
1 1/4 cup chopped cilantro
juice of 1/2 lime 

Combine all ingredients in a bowl and mix together. Refrigerate. Serve cold. 

 

Rhubarb relish

2 cups rhubarb (in 1/4-in. pieces)
1 cup medium-chopped onion
1/2 cup water
1/3 cup vinegar
1 cup sugar or sweetener
1/4 tsp cinnemon
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/4 tsp allspice
1/8 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp salt 

 

Combine all the ingredients in a large saucepan. Bring mixture to a boil, 
stirring frequently. Cook until thick, making sure mixture does not stick and 
burn. Store in refrigerator. Serve hot or cold.

 

 © 2004 MSNBC Interactive