And another great twist is strawberry-rhubarb! Ice cream optional. Jill in Washington state From: "C. Koch" <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Saturday, October 07, 2006 8:04 PM Subject: [ARMSTRONG] Fw: OT > does everyone in the world love rhubarb pie or just A*'s??? it's my > absolute #1 favorite and i haven't had it for years since my grandmother > made it for me on the farm. she tricked me into eating it - to my later > delight.

My grandmother was a Maine lady from many generations of Mainers. She had a lot of uses for rhubarb besides pie...rhubarb sauce, for one. It was just rhubarb, sliced, poached until tender with a little water, sweetened with sugar. We just ate that in a bowl. Then there was "spring tonic" which, I think, was the concentrated liquid from cooking rhubarb in a small amount of water...if anybody knows what too much rhubarb will do to you, I think that's why it was called spring tonic: it cleaned folks out and got them going after a long winter, or I suppose that's what it did. (Thanks goodness I never had to try it!) Also, if she had indigestion, she had a blue bottle from the pharmacist of "rhubarb and soda" which I think was probably bicarbonate of soda and some concentrated rhubarb "juice." Rhubarb, in these parts, anyway, is the first plant that pokes through the still icy earth in the garden and is the first fresh plant available, especially in the olden days when you couldn't buy strawberries from Florida or California in the market, for sauces and pies and other goodies. No wonder it was called "pie plant." Although it's a vegetable, it's use is that of a fruit. The leaves of rhubarb are poisonous...I believe they are loaded with oxalic acid ( or some such)...but the stalks are very useful. Besides using it for pies, tarts, upside-down cake, fruit bread, jam, conserve, etc., I like to cook rhubarb, add sugar, then strain the rhubarb and use the sweetened "juice" for punch. It's terrific mixed with lemonade. People don't know what the flavor is, but love it, and I've had people who say they hate rhubarb love rhubarb punch. And, of course, there's John up in Alaska making his rhubarb wine... I remember when I was a little girl my grandmother would tell me that the huge leaves, made lacey courtesy of some kind of chewing insect, were parasols to make shade for garden fairies...kind of a nice image. Cousin Marilyn ----- Original Message ----- From: "Jill Johnston" <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Sunday, October 08, 2006 12:59 AM Subject: [ARMSTRONG] rhubarb OT > And another great twist is strawberry-rhubarb! Ice cream optional. > > Jill in Washington state > > > From: "C. Koch" <[email protected]> > To: <[email protected]> > Sent: Saturday, October 07, 2006 8:04 PM > Subject: [ARMSTRONG] Fw: OT > > >> does everyone in the world love rhubarb pie or just A*'s??? it's my >> absolute #1 favorite and i haven't had it for years since my grandmother >> made it for me on the farm. she tricked me into eating it - to my later >> delight. > > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the > quotes in the subject and the body of the message