Rhubarb: New and Classic Recipes for Sweet and Savory Dishes

Rhubarb may not be a polarizing as, say, natto, but its reputation is quite narrow: we all know we can make a pie with it, or a batch of jam…but as this book acknowledges, even for its ardent admirers, “it is hardly as useful in everyday cooking as, for example, root vegetables and cabbage.” 

Danish food writer Søren Staun Petersen aims to change that in this brief and broad overview of uses for the long and narrow stalk. 

Several recipes are variations on those familiar themes (compote, chutney, relish) and suggestions for places you might not think to use those products  pulled pork burgers, rhubarb sandwich cookies). More interesting perhaps are new places to put the stalk itself, such as sweet and sour wok, in which sliced rhubarb brings the sour to beef, lemongrass, snow peas, edamame, and other vegetable friends). At the end is a selection of cocktails (rhubarb gin and tonic; a “light & stormy”). 

Some other examples: 

• Pizza bianca
• Risotto
• Spring meringue
• Baked brie
• Coriander smash

If you’re in a rhubarb rut, there are enough new ideas here to get you out of it—but not so many that you’ll get the wrong idea and start substituting it for onions. The book is just over 100 pages long, and still makes room in the middle for “a rhubarb farmer’s story.” 

Still, the selection of recipes is appealing and accessible, requiring no special equipment or advanced technique; the recipe for rhubarb juice calls for a strainer, not a juicer. 

Hardcover. Color photos throughout.