Alan Davidson

Rhubarb

Appears in
Oxford Companion to Food
Oxford Companion to Food

By Alan Davidson

Published 2014

  • About

rhubarb the edible stalks of Rheum rhabarbarum and two or three other species of the same genus, in the family Polygonaceae. Botanically, rhubarb is a vegetable; but the US Customs Court at Buffalo, NY, ruled in 1947 that it was a fruit, since that is how it is normally eaten.

Wild rhubarbs are all native to Asia. They prefer a cool climate and flourish especially in the general area of Mongolia and Siberia and in the vicinity of the Himalayas. The rhizomes and ‘crowns’ from which the leaf-bearing stalks grow survive readily in ground which is frozen during the winter.