Rhubarb...

So I mentioned that I cut my rhubarb this weekend. I went out there with a pair of kitchen scissors and hacked away at the HUGE bushy plant. Here is a reminder picture of what it looked like...Keep in mind these pics were taken in late April so the plant was about 5x that size by the time I cut it. I forgot to take a recent pic...





I don't have much experience with rhubarb. I don't really know what to do with it. My mom told me the leaves can't be eaten, so I cut those off and put them in the compost pile. After I cut all the stalks down, I looked on the internet on how to store them. It was then that I read you should only "harvest" 2/3 of the plant at one time and snap it off rather than cut it. Oops. Oh well, hopefully the plant will come back next year.

Rhubarb looks kinda like huge stalks of celery, only some of them are red. I read on the internet that the stalks turn red in cold climates. Most of mine were red. Guess that gives a good indication of what winter is like! Brrr.

Mine looked like this...



This isn't my picture - but some of my leaves were this big too! Crazy....



My grandmother loves rhubarb, so I put most of my stalks in plastic bags in the fridge to save for her. I decided to try and make at least one thing so I could say I tried :) I found this recipe on the internet and picked it because it looked the easiest!

Rhubarb Bars

Ingredients:

Crust:

1 1/3 cups flour
1/2 cup sugar
2/3 cup butter or margarine

Filling:

2 cups sugar
1/3 cup flour
2 eggs
3 cups finely chopped rhubarb

Procedure:
•Mix the crust ingredients like a pie crust and pat into a 9x13 inch cake pan.
•Mix the filling ingredients well, spoon into crust and bake 350 degrees for 45 minutes.

I ended up cooking mine waaay longer than 45 mins (I think at least 60, maybe even longer), but I used a casserole dish rather a cake pan because I didn't have that size pan. Here is the finished product.



By the time it was finally finished cooking, I was already full from dinner (and ice cream). The website did say it should be served warm, but I tried some today cold from the refrigerator. I kept thinking as I made the recipe, "this sure seems like a lot of sugar." It tasted that way too...It wasn't my favorite, but I'm going to give it another chance one time heated back up :)