Rhubarb: No Rue and No Barb!

Here’s to the lowly rhubarb leaf! My octogenarian friend Ken called to ask if I’d like some more rhubarb. He was harvesting his patch and I happily said, “Yes! And please bring the leaves too!” Ken responded with a shocked, “No, they are poisonous!” Having been an extension agent for something like forty years, he knows what he is talking about. I explained that I use them on my pots, not in them. They have lovely veining—not as fine as that of the even-more-lowly burdock, but impressively dramatic and strong. Ken arrived on his 4-wheeler with an armload of magnificent rhubarb stalks with all their leaves.

Due to the thick center stalk in a rhubarb leaf, using the leaf as it grows can cut right through the clay when I lay it out. Hence, I trim that thick area down level with the rest of leaf with sharp scissors or a knife. This gets easier with practice and I go through enough burdock and rhubarb leaves in their season to have plenty of that. Then the leaf is laid on wet, rolled-out clay and I cut around it. (I never went to kindergarten and have been making up for that ever since.) Next the leaves are dropped inside a large, plastic-draped, aluminum bowl of a pleasant shape. I make sure the bottoms of the leaves are well smoothed (read that as “smooshed”) together and the upper leaves each free to show itself off. Two or three days later, I left the whole thing out of the bowl, clean all the many edges, and set it on the racks to dry. Those leaves are majestic! If I knew where to put it, I might keep one of these big pots!