One of my family's treasures is a black and white newspaper photo of my grandfather as a handsome young man in a plaid jacket, picking rhubarb in his dad's rhubarb house near Detroit in the 1930s. Rhubarb was so much in demand that by at least one account, those hothouses were on every farm in the area.

This photo of a long-vanished practice makes me wonder — now that all foods are available at all times, have we lost the keen pleasure of anticipating the first foods of spring?

Back then the refreshing tartness of spring rhubarb was something the country cherished so much it couldn't come early enough.

"After a winter of cellar-stored and frozen vegetables, buckwheat cakes and syrup, mince pies and pies made from fruits "put up" in syrup the previous summer - altogether a diet which hardly needed the added fuel of close, artificially heated air (not forgetting the intimate part played by flannel underwear) to get a very flame of desire for things fresh and acid - after even the supplies of preserved fruit had dwindled and given out, except in the larders of the most prudent - Friend Rhubarb achieved his destiny by sending up his crisp shoots into the smiling sunshine of the earliest spring. The first rhubarb pie of the season marked a festival day and spring house-cleaning was in order."

-From Winter Rhubarb, Culture and Marketing, Reginald Bland, 1915

Rhubarb saw its greatest popularity in a heyday between World War I and World War II. The rich sandy loam soil near Detroit was ideal for growing hothouse rhubarb.

After the roots had been plowed up in the fall and then allowed to freeze, they could be planted in a heated shed (a "root house") where the plants would grow, even without light. The harvested rhubarb could be shipped cross country tied with ribbon in long-stemmed rose boxes from January-April.

According to Edward Hafeli (whose father helped start the practice): "The hothouse rhubarb industry prospered for decades. At one time root houses appeared on virtually every farm in Macomb County. The crop became so  important that in the late 1940s and early 1950s, an annual Rhubarb Festival was held in Utica, complete with a queen and her court.  A headline in the Utica Sentinel in October 1953 proclaimed Utica the “Rhubarb Center of the World.”  

Nearly 60 years later, Utica may no longer be the Rhubarb Center of the World, but according to the Michigan Department of Agriculture, Michigan is still the third largest producer of rhubarb in the country. They say "this is due to the ideal climate here in Michigan, with an average winter temperature below 40 degrees and an average summer temperature below 75 degrees." 

According to the Rhubarb Compendium, the earliest historical records of rhubarb come from 2700 BC China where it was cultivated as a medicinal purgative. There are dozens of varieties of rhubarb (some sources say up to 60), some with red or pink stalks, some with green. Some varieties are planted more for medicinal than edible purposes.

Varying accounts are given of rhubarb's arrival in America, but the Rhubarb Compendium version says: "Early records of rhubarb in America identify an unnamed Maine gardener as having obtained seed or root stock from Europe in the period between 1790-1800. He introduced it to growers in Massachusetts where its popularity spread and by 1822 it was sold in produce markets."

By 1778 when it was first recorded as a food plant in Europe, rhubarb was being used as a filling for tarts and pies. Rhubarb Custard Pie is traditional in my family. And even though I definitely play for Team Pie and am very much looking forward to the first rhubarb pie of the year, I can also appreciate Team Cake. If you are looking forward to rhubarb this year, might I suggest a delightful Rhubarb Pudding Cake?

Rhubarb Pudding Cake
To make this delicious spring dessert, first make a rhubarb sauce that will go in the bottom of a buttered dish, then put the cake batter on top. Best served warm, it's also great for breakfast.

Rhubarb Sauce
2 cups chopped rhubarb
1 cups chopped strawberries (or apple or more rhubarb)
1/3 cup sugar
Optional: 1/2 teaspoon grated ginger OR 1 tablespoon chopped candied ginger OR 1 tablespoon grand marnier OR 1 tablespoon  orange flower water
Simmer all together until soft. Add optional ingredient at the end.

Cake
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup spelt flour (I like Jennings Bros. spelt flour, or use 1/2 cup whole wheat and 1/2 cup regular flour)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg
2/3 cup milk (or sour milk or cream)
5 tablespoon melted butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
Whisk together dry ingredients. In separate bowl, whisk together wet ingredients. Combine gently. Put hot rhubarb sauce in the bottom of buttered baking dish (8x8 Pyrex pan or several small ramekins), and pour batter over the top. Spread evenly.

Bake at 400 degrees until center of the cake comes out clean on a toothpick, about 25 minutes. Extra good served warm! With whipped cream!

Kim Bayer is a freelance writer and culinary researcher. Email her at kimbayer@gmail.com.