Rhubarb just doesn’t get any respect. ‘Do you think the rain will hurt the rhubarb?’ is a well-used comical saying. Sometimes this has been changed to “help” as by Phil Silvers in Summer Stock. Comics know the humour in ‘rhubarb’ comes faster than a forced stem. ‘Never rub another man’s rhubarb,” advised Jack Nicolson as The Joker in Batman (1989). Even less suggestively was Brit schoolboys’ challenge “what’s long and thin, covered in skin, red in parts and stuck in tarts?”
Long before he attained fame as Mr. Spock, Leonard Nemoy appeared uncredited in the 1951 movie Rhubarb. Adapted from a 1946 novel, the screwball comedy featured 14 different cats named Rhubarb playing the sole heir of a Brooklyn baseball team. ‘Rhubarb’ is baseball slang for an on-field argument or fight. Crossing the Atlantic a 1969 British ‘short’ of the same name, written and directed by Eric Sykes starred himself and Harry Secombe in which the entire dialogue and cast’s names are ‘rhubarb.’
Repeatedly muttered ‘rhubarb’ in the background on stage, on radio and in movies, directors believed it sounded like undistinguished conversation and was used to great effect in the BBC Goon Show.
‘Give me the rhubarb and you may take the senna’ says a French proverb, while from Germany comes the observation that, ‘Rhubarb and senna can work wonders.’ Neither were helped when in World War II, a ‘rhubarb’ was the RAF code for a fighter or fighter-bomber sortie under low-cloud conditions undertaken to search out targets of opportunity, mainly over occupied France.
Lawyers, ever loathe of missing an opportunity to turn a new leaf, actually left rhubarb, at least if imported, better off. A New York court decided in 1947 that, since it was used in the United States as a fruit, it counted as a fruit for the purposes of regulation and duties. Since fruit paid lower rates than vegetables, this was a definite benefit.
All of which doesn’t deter residents in Pennsylvania’s Amish Country from rhubarb. Every mid-May the unincorporated village of Intercourse holds its annual Rhubarb Festival. Founded in 1754, there are several suggestions as to the origins of Lancaster County community name.
It should come as no surprise then that cultivated rhubarb is listed under several botanical designations: Rheum x cultorum, R. x hybridum and R. rhaponticum. All agree though that this perennial vegetable is the first food to be harvested in spring thanks to its stalks, or petioles in botany-speak.
Native to Asia, it is a member of the Polygonaceae, consisting of 49 genera of about 1000 species of herbs, shrubs and even a few small trees
The root was known to ancient Chinese physicians as an effective cathartic and laxative. Today, traditional Chinese medicine continues to use R. tanguticum root as a purgative, as well as for treating intestinal or stomach fever.
Culpepper’s Complete Herbal of Nicolas Culpepper (1616-54) notes R. palmatum root as mild purgative. The root of culinary or tart, R. rhaponicum, is a weaker purgative than Oriental rhubarb. According to Culpepper it was from Scythia and under the dominion of Mars. He also recommends it as good against venomous bites.
Not withstanding the claims of Intercourse, Pennsylvania, the very best North American rhubarb is claimed by connoisseurs of the petiole to be commercially raised in Michigan and Ontario. But while this does not seem to tempt Michigan to celebrate, the small village of Shedden, Ontario holds its Rosy Rhubarb Festival every second week of June, proclaiming that it has placed the community on the map.
This is for both late spring production and ‘forced rhubarb.’ In horticultural practice, ‘forcing’ refers to blanching such crops as asparagus, celery, chicory and rhubarb to create sweeter, tender crops. Asparagus and celery are ‘earthed up,’ the soil drawn around their emerging stems. Chicory and rhubarb are grown in the dark from roots brought into darkened sheds for that purpose. The sound of rhubarb emerging in this way – crackling and crunching – can be unnerving to the uninitiated. In the UK, the ‘Rhubarb Triangle’ formed by Wakefield, Leeds and Morley found fame for such forcing practices.
While the succulent stems are used in pies, tarts, as stewed rhubarb perhaps with custard, relish, rhubarb and ginger jam, non-alcoholic punch and even wine, the leaves are toxic. They contain oxalic acid crystals, intriguingly the same as found in the infamous Dumbcane, or Dieffenbachia, and other members of the vast Araceae. Despite this it was suggested by British bureaucrats in World War I as a foodstuff suitable to raise rabbits on – a suggestion quickly retracted.
More recently with rising concern over ‘chemical’ pesticides, the leaves have been suggested as a ‘natural’ pesticide. Boiled, strained and the resulting liquid when cooled can used as a garden spray, it is claimed, although at least one source warns ominously not to use the cookware for anything else.
Beside that intriguingly named Intercourse Rhubarb Festival in May, many more are held this month around North America:
Canada:
Rhubarb Rhapsody Rhubarb Festival, Dartmouth, Nova Scotia – June
Rhubarb Fest Calgary, Alberta – June
United States:
Aledo Rhubarb Fest, Illinois – early June
Duluth Rhubarb Festival, Minnesota – late June
High Desert Rhubarb Festival, La Pine, Oregon – mid-June
Lanesboro Rhubarb Festival, Minnesota – June
Manchester Rhubarb Fest, Iowa – first Saturday June
Pine Grove Rhubarb Festival, Colorado – mid-June
Whoop-Up Days & Rhubarb Festival, Conrad, Montana – June
Wes Porter is a horticultural consultant and writer based in Toronto. Wes has over 40 years of experience in both temperate and tropical horticulture from three continents.
