My son gave a holler and wants to know the best way to freeze it to use for rhubarb bread. States it is coming up nice but then the tops start drying out. He wants to know if he can harvest it, cut tops off and throw it in the freezer till he has enough for bread. Thanks for any I can pass on.
Don’t see why not. Bread won’t require it to hold shape. When unthawed it’ll be mushy like vs. firm. I’d vacuum seal them. Heck I’m just trying to keep my new ones alive. This summers heat and no moisture has been hard on them.
Would you tell him to cut in small pieces first? He is out in colorado and he said it has been hot and dry
I freeze my rhubarb after cutting it into sized pieces that'll be used in the future. While there are still stalks growing, I've stopped harvesting to let the plants build up energy for next year.
Rhubarb needs a lot of manure and/or compost. Make sure you're adding each year. Otherwise what MikeinMa said
I like to water the night before. Don't know if that really matters, but my great grandmother did it. I make rhubarb sauce for ice cream. When we were kids, we took club soda and rhubarb sauce and mixed for a type of soda pop.
I am assuming we are talking about adding this to the plants and not to the bag of sized pieces that we are going to freeze??!! Please confirm before I vacuum seal these pieces. I don't want to have to run out for a bag of steer manure.
It depends on how you plan on eating it. Or who you are serving it to. Either way...sheep manure. Not steer, that stuff is inedible.
I prefer that compost/manure NOT be a component of my edible rhubarb. In the late fall, I pull back all mulch from around each plant. I then spread a decent compost layer around each plant, but not on top of the crown. I then replace mulch on top of the compost. That's all the fertilizing I do, every year.
I only harvest two or three times in the Spring- no more than 30 or 40% at a time, then let it go. It usually dries up in a really hot dry Summer anyway. Ours used to get chicken manure every year, alas, no more chickens. Mine needs transplanting/dividing bad. I cut the stems into one inch pieces, freeze them on a tray, then when frozen in an hour or two put two cups into a quart Foodsaver bag and do the vacuum seal job on them. Really helps with freezer burn. They will be mushy and will likely have water separation though when thawed for use, but usually that's OK anyway.
