After a long weekend, it’s kind of nice to get back to some semblance of normal around the yard and gardens.
Several people in the last week have been complaining about their excess of rhubarb and were wondering what to do with it besides, of course, giving it away.
On a rainy day, it’s a perfect time to bake up a couple of rhubarb cakes for the freezer.
If you have a very large patch of rhubarb, stew sauces to freeze for the fall or much can be used making a delicious drink for the summer, and the recipe below is ideal.
Grandma’s Rhubarb Cake
1- 1/4 cups white sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 eggs, beaten
1 cup sour cream
3 cups diced rhubarb
1 cup white sugar
1/4 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
Ground cinnamon, for dusting
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9×13 inch baking dish.
In a large bowl, stir together 1-1/4 cups sugar, baking soda, salt and two cups flour. Stir in the eggs and sour cream until smooth, then fold in the rhubarb.
Pour into the prepared dish and spread evenly. In a smaller bowl, stir together the remaining one cup sugar and butter until smooth. Stir in 1/4 cup flour until the mixture is crumbly. Sprinkle the mixture on top of the cake then dust lightly with cinnamon.
Bake in the preheated oven until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 45 minutes.
Rhubarb Punch Slush
16 cups chopped rhubarb
12 cups water
3 cups white sugar
3/4 cup lemon juice
1 (6 ounce) can frozen orange juice concentrate
2 (2 liter) bottles lemon-lime soda
Mix rhubarb with water in a large pot and bring to a boil; lower heat to medium-low and simmer until rhubarb becomes mushy, 10 to 15 minutes. Strain juice into a large freezer-proof container. Discard pulp.
Stir sugar, lemon juice, and orange juice concentrate into the rhubarb juice, dissolving sugar, and place in freezer overnight.
Stir mixture the next day, then stir every two to three hours until slushy.
If left in freezer unstirred, the punch base will freeze hard; to thaw, microwave, 1 cup at a time, until slushy, 30 seconds to one minute.
Mix slushy punch base with lemon-lime soda in a large punch bowl until combined.
To serve in individual glasses, mix half punch base with half lemon-lime soda in a large glass.
