Among many uses for rhubarb, try marmalade

I don’t know about your rhubarb, but mine unfolded its dark green leaves, and lengthened out its red stalks in about a week and a half. We can eat just so much rhubarb crisp which we dearly love, and so last year when Lucile White in Bangor sent me a recipe for a rhubarb marmalade she makes, I tucked it away as one more thing to do with this productive plant.

Lucile wrote, “I figured you had plenty of rhubarb which brought to mind one of my favorite recipes,” and she explained: “It was given to me years ago by an older lady, Blanche Cyr, now deceased.”

So we know rhubarb is good for dessert, and I bet you make pie or crisp or some kind of pudding. Or maybe you are a rhubarb-wine maker. It also works well in chutney, and making a batch of that is an annual event at our house.

I remember when I was first living on my own, I rented an apartment with a much neglected rhubarb plant in the backyard. I found a recipe calling for a strawberry rhubarb jam made with chopped rhubarb and strawberry Jell-O. I harvested some rhubarb and cooked ‘er up. As I recall, the color was really alarming, but it tasted pretty good. I’d prefer these days to go find a pick-your-own operation and bring home fresh strawberries to mix with rhubarb, but the idea basically is that I have the habit now of doing lots of different things with rhubarb.

Funny thing, I don’t think people use jelly and jam as plentifully in cooking anymore as we did in past times. For example, using jam as a filling for a layer cake, or spread on the bread used for bread pudding, or for filling cookies. This marmalade is very nice; the pineapple is a great addition. It is wonderful on toast, and it would be so good in little tartlets. If you can’t find juice oranges, the kind with thin skins, then use the navel sorts, but scrape as much of the white off as you can. I use scissors to cut the peel very thinly.

Rhubarb Marmalade

Yields 4 pints.

7 cups of rhubarb

6 cups of sugar

1 20-ounce can of crushed pineapple, drained

2 oranges and 1 lemon

Cut the rhubarb in small pieces, add sugar, and let it set overnight. Next day, cut the oranges and the lemon so that the peel is cut very thinly and the pulp chunked up. Add them and the pineapple, stir well to get the sugar well mixed with all the ingredients, and then cook for an hour until the peel is translucent and the mixture sheets off a spoon. Spoon into jars, seal, and process if you wish, in a boiling water bath.