FORCING RHUBARB

Martin Fish explains how to bring forward those first sweet stems of spring

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Rhubarb has long been a firm favourite with gardeners for its tasty stalks, and I have fond memories of pulling young stalks of rhubarb fresh from my Grandma's garden as a young child and dipping them into a paper cone of sugar!

In late winter, she would also cover over a clump with an old dolly tub to exclude the light, resulting in delicious, sweet, pink sticks in spring. This forced rhubarb was always welcomed as one of the first spring crops from the garden after a long winter.

A hardy perennial, rhubarb originates from Siberia, and for more than 2,000 years it has been used for its healing and medicinal properties across Asia and Europe. We've been eating the fleshy stalks in the UK since the 1700s, and the first forced stalks of rhubarb were discovered in 1817 at the Chelsea Physic Garden, where a clump of rhubarb was accidentally covered over. On uncovering the rhubarb long, pink sticks were discovered, and the rest, as they say, is history.

By the late 1870s, huge quantities of forced rhubarb were being grown in South Yorkshire in an area known as the Rhubarb Triangle. The cooler, moist climate was perfect for growing, and coal from local mines was in plentiful supply to heat the large, low, wooden sheds where the rhubarb was grown in total darkness. Established clumps would be lifted from the fields in November and brought into the sheds, where the dark and warmth forced them into early growth.

A daily steam train, known as the Rhubarb Express, ran from Yorkshire to London to supply Covent Garden and onwards around the world with Yorkshire's finest forced rhubarb. Sadly, after the Second World War, the industry declined, but over recent years it has become popular once again and is now thriving in Yorkshire.