Rhubarb

Every day I read “Britt-Arnhild's House in the Woods” Blog. This morning I read her post about “A love story between rhuburb and red chilli” . Now I have never tried rhubarb with chilies, but I do love rhubarb.

In my garden at our old house I had two large beds of rhubarb. Our youngest son K is the reason for the large beds of rhubarb. One fall day he was in one of those teenage bad tempers and making everyone's live a misery. So I ordered him out of the house telling him he had to spade over the garden. He went out and started to spade. Boy did he ever spade. He managed to spade over the entire garden that afternoon including the two much smaller beds of rhubarb. I didn’t give it much thought until the next spring when two large beds of rhubarb came up. Now having two large rhubarb beds didn't bother me, because I think that you can never have too much rhubarb.

However seven years ago, because of my deteriorating health, we had to move. At our new house we are part of a housing association and are not allowed gardens. However, I decided to try planting some rhubarb at the back on our yard in an area where the lawn care people don’t go. Two years ago I planted a number of rhubarb plants. I have been disappointed in the results. The rhubarb has come up each spring but it doesn’t look hardy nor does it seem to grow. Maybe it is too close to the trees? Maybe the soil isn’t the correct type for growing rhubarb.

So now I must rely on my brothers and sisters, who all live out of state, to bring rhubarb if they visit in the spring. Some years I get rhubarb and some years I don’t. Maybe this will be one of the years I will be able to get some. If so there will be rhubarb pie, rhubarb cake, rhubarb on a cloud, and any number of other rhubarb dishes.