In case you haven’t met yet, let me introduce you to THE SHRUB—the kind you drink. This rhubarb shrub recipe is a bright, sweet-tart way to preserve the season and bring a little sparkle to everyday sipping.
Shrub What?
At its heart, a shrub is a sweetened fruit syrup mixed with vinegar to preserve summer flavors. In practice, shrubs are best sipped with friends who are as bubbly and sweet/tart as the flavors flowing from the glass.
The magic of any shrub is how it brings together the sweetness of the fruit with the acid of vinegar—creating a depth of flavor that lays down a perfect base to build on. But typical of true magic, there’s a third part: the health benefits of probiotics and enzymes from the apple cider vinegar complete the trinity.
Stephanie and I before Covid, at a WBL Farmers Market after she taught a fermentation class
When I first made shrubs, I cooked my rhubarb (and other fruits), then strained the juice and added vinegar. But there is a fresher flavor with fermenting. This may seem counterintuitive, but hear me out. When you skip cooking the fruit, you retain some great high notes from the rhubarb. Similar to fresh strawberry jam versus cooked strawberry jam…
Stephanie Thurow, my friend and coauthor of Small-Scale Homesteading, is also a master food preserver at Minnesota from Scratch. She first opened my eyes to fermenting shrubs and I will never go back!
I love a good two for one, and garlic delivers every time!
Garlic bulbs are used to flavor foods the world over, and one of the best kept secrets about garlic is the garlic scape! One of the joys of growing garlic scapes is that you get an early summer harvest before the bulbs are even ready to pull from the garden.
Because of the way hardneck garlic grows, there are two chances to harvest deliciousness. We all know about garlic cloves, technically the bulb, harvested in late summer. The beautiful single flower stalks that shoot up from the center around midsummer in my region are a delicacy known as the garlic scape.
The garlic scape is slightly milder and somehow ‘brighter’ than the underground cloves. They can be eaten raw or cooked with the flavor changing drastically after heating. I enjoy eating them in a few different ways.
A garlic scape pesto – recipe below.
Grilling them with a drizzle of olive oil and a squeeze of lemon juice – when they magically taste like asparagus.
Fermenting for a spicy mid-winter snack – I use the basic 1 tbsp kosher salt in 2 cups water ratios.
They show up around midsummer in farmers markets, but the surest way to gather garlic scapes is to grow your own!
Watch your garlic closely for timing your harvest. They shoot up from the top of the plants in June and start straight, then curl around themselves. Once the garlic scapes have curled around and you can see where a flower would eventually emerge from, it’s time to get snipping- or pulling. I snipped the scapes right where they come out of the stalk for years, but found that by SLOWLY and gently pulling, you can release the scape lower down, giving you access to more, and more tender scape goodness!
I prefer to take them on the early side, when they are softer and more tender eating. And I recommend the smaller ones for fermenting.
But if you get ‘tough’ or fibrous scapes, those are great for the garlic scape pesto recipe below.
You can harvest them when you want, depending on your end goals… and a little nibble goes a long way if you’re unsure!
You will also want to snip off the flower tips and add to the compost as the buds can harbor bad bacteria if fermenting. Plus I just don’t dig the texture.
Garlic Scape Pesto Recipe
Ingredients: 1 cup + of garlic scapes, chopped ½ cup basil Juice from ½ lemon ½ tsp+ salt ½ cup extra virgin olive oil ¼ cup sunflower seeds or pine nuts ¼ cup grated Parmesan / Parmigiano Reggiano cheese
Instructions: Place scapes in food processor (or Ninja) and pulse to chop finely, add all ingredients but the olive oil and pulse until well-combined. Then drizzle in (or add in batches to Ninja) olive oil. Try to freeze half for a mid-winter burst of summer flavor! *If using raw seeds or nuts, toast before using.
Let me know if you’ve tried growing garlic scapes and your favorite way to enjoy them!
This was the first herbal salves I ever made, years ago, and it’s still one of my all-time favorites. I use it pretty much daily! Calendula salve softens, heals, soothes, and calms my skin in ways that nothing else can.
Making salve is kind of the gateway herbal bath and body product. Once you realize that you can mix a few natural, quality ingredients and end up with a practical, beautiful, and healing product, it’s empowering. I want you to feel that power too!
