Rhubarb Sauce

Warm rhubarb sundae

Stir it into oatmeal, spoon it warm over vanilla ice creams for a delicious sundae,  put it on your holiday table in place of cranberry sauce, or just spread it on toast.  Rhubarb sauce zings with tart flavor and bright color.

My friends Christopher and Barbara have a big garden.  Last spring they filled their freezer with rhubarb.  When I went to visit them in early November, they were busy harvesting the last of their garden crops for the season and needed to make room in their freezer, so they sent me home with a metric buttload of frozen rhubarb. If you have your own rhubarb plant, great, but if not, don't give up hope.  If you have access to a friend with a rhubarb plant, they can almost never eat all of their rhubarb, so you might be doing them a favor by offering to take some off their hands.

I am such a good friend.

The sauce is super easy to make.  Just put about 2 cups of rhubarb into a sauce pan with a splash (about 1/4 cup) of orange juice, a generous shake of cinnamon, and sweeten to taste with brown sugar.  Let it cook over low heat, stirring occasionally, until it is smooth and the consistency of apple sauce.

Sometimes, the sauce looks a little brown and not so attractive, so you can make it festive by grating in a couple of tablespoons of fresh beet.  This is totally optional and doesn't change the flavor at all.

Beet adds color.

I'm planning on putting this on my holiday table as a surprise alternative to cranberry sauce.  Your guests will be amazed at how delicious this simple sauce is.