If you know what’s good for you, don’t “stay out of the rhubarb”
Dan Brawner
May 15, 2007
Rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb. It’s a tongue twister. It’s a goofy word. It’s a sour weed. It’s another name for nonsense. And it makes surprisingly good pie. Rhubarb grows practically everywhere and this is the height of rhubarb season. Prized for thousands of years for its medicinal qualities and described in detail by Marco Polo, the humble rhubarb doesn’t get much respect these days.
Tracing the origins of rhubarb is difficult because humans have been using it for so long. The first written reference to the vegetable (yes, rhubarb is a vegetable) dates from 2,700 BC in China, where it was used as a purgative– that means laxative. For some reason, purgatives were extremely important to ancient Chinese aristocrats, especially emperors. (Somebody should start a rhubarb patch on the White House lawn.) Baskets of rhubarb were presented to royalty of the Tang dynasty (618-907) as tributes. In 1759, the Qianlong emperor of the Qing dynasty was so angry over a boarder dispute with the Russians that he stopped shipping them tea and rhubarb and waited for the Russians to come crawling back on their knees to beg forgiveness.
In 1839, Lin Zexu, the imperial commissioner threatened Queen Victoria that if England didn’t stop trading in opium, China would halt exports of rhubarb, explaining that, without it, the English would surely die. Unfortunately, the queen apparently never had Lin Zexu’s letter translated and the result was the Opium War.
Cultivation of rhubarb made its way from China through Russia to Western Europe where, after sugar became affordable, it was used in pastries. Eventually rhubarb landed in the United States where the sturdy plant thrived and marked the boundaries of many back yards. “Stay out of the rhubarb!” became a common expression in Iowa because when playing croquet, if you hit one out of bounds into the rhubarb, you would lose your turn.
The word “rhubarb” can be traced from several sources, including the Middle Latin “reubarbarum”, meaning “barbarian rhubarb”. The word “barbarian” meant, among other things, anybody who didn’t speak Greek and who’s speech, at least to a Greek, sounded like gibberish. In Sanskrit, “barbara” is a word for stammering. I don’t know what any of this has to do with rhubarb, but if you eat enough of the sour stalks, you’ll find you can’t say, “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.”
In baseball, “rhubarb” is a word for any loud argument, as in, “All right. Let’s cut the rhubarb and play ball!” In speech or writing “rhubarb” can also refer to a long string of useless blather, as in...well, I can’t think of any examples off hand.
Besides making tasty pies, rhubarb also makes an effective insecticide. This is because the leaves contain poisonous oxalic acid. When boiled, rhubarb roots create a powerful dye for turning blonde hair a lovely golden color. I know what you’re thinking. People actually eat this stuff? Yes, in fact, if you keep rhubarb around, there is practically no limit to the strange and indigestible things you can eat because–did I mention?– rhubarb also makes a nice purgative.
Tracing the origins of rhubarb is difficult because humans have been using it for so long. The first written reference to the vegetable (yes, rhubarb is a vegetable) dates from 2,700 BC in China, where it was used as a purgative– that means laxative. For some reason, purgatives were extremely important to ancient Chinese aristocrats, especially emperors. (Somebody should start a rhubarb patch on the White House lawn.) Baskets of rhubarb were presented to royalty of the Tang dynasty (618-907) as tributes. In 1759, the Qianlong emperor of the Qing dynasty was so angry over a boarder dispute with the Russians that he stopped shipping them tea and rhubarb and waited for the Russians to come crawling back on their knees to beg forgiveness.
In 1839, Lin Zexu, the imperial commissioner threatened Queen Victoria that if England didn’t stop trading in opium, China would halt exports of rhubarb, explaining that, without it, the English would surely die. Unfortunately, the queen apparently never had Lin Zexu’s letter translated and the result was the Opium War.
Cultivation of rhubarb made its way from China through Russia to Western Europe where, after sugar became affordable, it was used in pastries. Eventually rhubarb landed in the United States where the sturdy plant thrived and marked the boundaries of many back yards. “Stay out of the rhubarb!” became a common expression in Iowa because when playing croquet, if you hit one out of bounds into the rhubarb, you would lose your turn.
The word “rhubarb” can be traced from several sources, including the Middle Latin “reubarbarum”, meaning “barbarian rhubarb”. The word “barbarian” meant, among other things, anybody who didn’t speak Greek and who’s speech, at least to a Greek, sounded like gibberish. In Sanskrit, “barbara” is a word for stammering. I don’t know what any of this has to do with rhubarb, but if you eat enough of the sour stalks, you’ll find you can’t say, “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.”
In baseball, “rhubarb” is a word for any loud argument, as in, “All right. Let’s cut the rhubarb and play ball!” In speech or writing “rhubarb” can also refer to a long string of useless blather, as in...well, I can’t think of any examples off hand.
Besides making tasty pies, rhubarb also makes an effective insecticide. This is because the leaves contain poisonous oxalic acid. When boiled, rhubarb roots create a powerful dye for turning blonde hair a lovely golden color. I know what you’re thinking. People actually eat this stuff? Yes, in fact, if you keep rhubarb around, there is practically no limit to the strange and indigestible things you can eat because–did I mention?– rhubarb also makes a nice purgative.