Triangulating Rhubarb

From Mongolia originally, fancy that, all the way to darkest Yorkshire's rhubarb triangle (more of which very soon). Know that I am not trying to make fools of you here. A second rhubarb blog in two days, keeping it regular. 

The first thing to say is that rhubarb is a member of the rheum family and rheum has a long tradition of cultivation in Europe for medicinal purposes stretching back into pre-historic times. When the strain of the plant that we know and love as an edible vegetable first arrived in Europe via the spice road from the Far East, the Greeks (who else?) were responsible for giving it the name by which we know it today. Their word for native rheum was rha (ῥᾶ) and they tagged on the word for a foreigner - barbaron (as in barbarian) - hence rhabarbara.

We've been munching it happily for nigh on a couple of thousand years, the stalks that is, for the leaves are slightly poisonous being high in oxalic acid, and I wonder who discovered that to their cost. Those ruby stalks may be consumed raw, just like celery, but they have a tart taste and so are usually cooked before eating, typically by stewing, and sweetened with a little honey or sugar. Rhubarb is high in fibre and in vitamins, so it is a good thing. And most of the rhubarb we eat in Britain is 'forced' rhubarb grown in Yorkshire. 

freshly strangulated 'forced' rhubarb (PDO)

Why Yorkshire? It's actually not even the whole county, but a small area of about 23 km²  in West Yorkshire between Wakefield, Morley and Rothwell, famously known as 'the rhubarb triangle', but more significantly referenced colloquially as 'the frosty pocket', wherein conditions are not dissimilar from the chilly Mongolian steppeland in which this strain of the plant originated. Rhubarb has thrived in the triangle's wet and frosty environment (with plentiful fertiliser in the form of 'night soil' from the nearby conurbations) since the 1800s.

To grow it in the quantities required to meet demand (not just in the UK but on the continent, prior to Brexit), Yorkshire rhubarb is 'forced'. Rhubarb plants spend a couple of happy years out in the fields without being harvested, soaking up sunlight which they store in their roots as carbohydrates. The roots are then subjected to November's sharp frosts before being moved indoors into sheds where they are kept in warm but completely dark conditions. Such an environment encourages them to continue growing and they convert the carbohydrates stored in their roots into glucose, resulting in tender stalks with the sour-sweet flavour for which forced rhubarb is known. When ready, the rhubarb is harvested by candlelight. At one time, during the season (December through to March) there would be a special nightly rhubarb train running from Ardley station to London to supply Covent Garden with the precious crop. Nowadays the supply chain is more varied and road-based. In 2010 Yorkshire Forced Rhubarb from the triangle was granted Protected Designation of Origin status (PDO) by the European Commission's Protected Food Name scheme. And then the weirdness begins... 

high-priestess Rhuby

Every February, the city of Wakefield holds its Rhubarb Festival, presided over by a high-priestess, three days of peace and music - no, sorry, that was Woodstock - three days in which the good citizens of the frosty pocket paint the town metaphorically rhubarby, with a large food and drink market extolling and selling local produce (including lots of rhubarb-related goodies), frequent cookery demonstrations (101 things to do with rhubarb), a rhubarb trail through the city, gardening and foraging workshops, arts and craft tents. sales of illuminated rhubarb stalks to light the up evening, lively street entertainments and of course demonstrations of how to strangulate rhubarb by candlelight, provided by a crack squad of ruthless rhubarbarian night harvesters.

ruthless rhubarbarian night harvesters

Here I should probably pause, and concede that I got a bit carried away with the high-priestess thing and that reference to demonstrations of rhubarb strangulation - though the photographs do not lie, and there is music. 

In conclusion, unlike Yorkshire Tea - which patently isn't grown in Yorkshire but is imported from Africa and Asia - Yorkshire Forced Rhubarb (PDO) is the proper job, the real McCoy, the dog's bollocks. Accept no substitute.

Rhubarbarians

Ruby shoes day for this year's

high priestess of rheum.

She has the stilettos heels,

her ceremonial light-wand

and teams of bloody stalkers

in her frosty pocket

rhubarbarians to a man

with their stainless Sheffield steels

and she's not shedding any tears.

It's open season

in the rhubarb triangle

and now is the hour

to cut those little beauties

down to size

ain't life unkind.

Here comes a candle 

to light up your sheds

and here comes a blade

to chop off your heads

and this being Yorkshire

no one is minded

to notice the screams.

Thanks for reading, S ;-)