Rhubarb, rhubarb

krappyrubsnif · February 2012

@ashman, can you get me some rhubarb by Saturday? Anyone seen any rhubarb in the shops?

Detritus · February 2012

I'm sure I saw rhubarb in Ash's shop the other day. It's in most greengrocers at the moment.

vetski · February 2012

It's certainly available in larger supermarkets,

krappyrubsnif · February 2012

Oh good. I've been too busy to get to the shops, and Mrs K (She Who Is Never Mistaken) assured me that rhubarb is a fruit, and therefore only available in the summer.

vetski · February 2012

It's been in supermarkets since just after Xmas. You can't buy bright pink (forced) rhubarb in the summer - at least, not forced British rhubarb.

miss annie · February 2012

It's a vegetable Krappy, and the forced rhubarb is available from Christmas to March. My chap is from right in the midst of Yorkshire's 'Rhubarb Triangle' and he can wax lyrical about rhubarb for quite some time.

vetski · February 2012

Oooh, miss annie, does he have a special secret purchasing source? I love the stuff, but get very exercised by the supermarket mark-ups... KRS, miss annie's right about it being a veg...but not all fruits are only available in summer! I picked my crab apples in November.

krappyrubsnif · February 2012

Crab apples - yum! Crab apple jelly. You're not the lucky owner of the Albert Road Crab Apples are you @vetski?

vetski · February 2012

@krappyrubsnif, If I say so myself, my Nov 2011 crab apple jelly was a triumph... I'm not on Albert Road. Does the Albert Road crab apple owner use their crab apples? If not, please whisper me the house number - the WI may want to go a-picking this autumn (with the owner's permission, naturally!), and make some to sell to connoisseurs like you!

krappyrubsnif · February 2012

@vetski glad to hear about your crab apple jelly. The crab apple trees belong to a neighbour over the wall at the bottom of my garden. Nobody was harvesting the fruit so a couple of years ago I asked permission to pick them and made some jelly - gave him a jar to say show him the result and say thanks. He's harvested them ever since, but he's never given me a jar back. Some people, eh? Perhaps he doesn't make jelly. Maybe he just chops them up and feeds them neat to his mother-in-law. *teeth immediately set on edge*

ashman · February 2012

hi guys, we did have some rhubarb but it wasnt really selling and it was getting wasted. i assumed it was something that didnt sell here, but ill bring some in and give it another go.

applehead · February 2012

I made chili crab apple jelly this autumn with some crab apples from a tree in Perth Road - I am pretty sure they are John Downie. It was the business but I just didn't make enough. Gave a few jars away chilli loving friends and then bosch it was all gone.

Detritus · February 2012

As Miss Annie said I am from the middle of the Rhubarb Triangle and if I never see another stick of rhubarb it will be to soon.But just hit it against a wall a few times peel it and dip it in sugar, did that every day on the way to school.

vetski · February 2012

@Detritus, does the hitting against a wall add something to the experience? The subtle tang of brick dust, perhaps?

miss annie · February 2012

I wondered about that.It's because they used to pick wild rhubarb on the way to school and eat it raw. Bashing it softens the rhubarb and brings the sugars out - like bruise on an apple. They'd then dip it in a little bag of sugar (which they carried about with them) and eat it. Sounds like olden times doesn't it.

vetski · February 2012

Very Victorian! Did they also also get rubbed with goose fat then stitched into their underwear?

miss annie · February 2012

No that's a recent development.

Detritus · February 2012

Just a hobby.

Idoru · February 2012

I love raw rhubarb!

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