Plant · P-295

Rhubarb

Rheum rhabarbarum

Rhubarb's edible part is the tart pink-to-green leaf stalk, usually stewed with sugar for pies and jam - the broad leaf blade itself is toxic and gets stripped off at harvest. It is naturally a long-lived perennial that needs a long hard winter to reset itself, so where summers run hot the usual crown rots and dies; grown instead from seed as a one-season winter crop, it still produces a full harvest before the heat takes it. Even the toxic leaves earn their keep - simmered in hot water they make a genuine homemade insecticide.