A drinking vinegar or shrub, originated in colonial times, is easily made at home with fruit you have available.

Rhubarb shrub. Since posting about it on Instagram, a few people have asked me how I made it.

Ingredients:

1 pound rhubarb, chopped
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup real honey (lots of the stuff in the store has added syrups)
1 cup raw apple cider vinegar

In a non-reactive pan, I use my Instant Pot stainless steel liner, stir together rhubarb, honey and sugar. Mush it around a bit, and let it sit until you see some liquid. They call it macerating…but if you cook like I do, mush it a bit and let it sit, works too.

Add the apple cider vinegar, bring to a boil, turn the burner to low and simmer for 20 minutes, covered, unless the rhubarb is soft and falling apart. You can help it along, if you want with a potato masher, but it’ll do it’s thing just by simmering it.

Turn off the heat, let it cool. Strain, pour into a bottle and enjoy. I use a cotton muslin tea towel to strain with, squeezing out as much liquid as I can.

Note: If you have raw honey, and want the benefits from that in your shrub, stir it in after you’ve strained the cool fruit.

Why honey and sugar. For this shrub, I like the flavor of the rhubarb to shine through, and my honey tends to be darker. So, I mix it half and half. You could do all sugar, try different vinegars, etc. But, this is what I like. I haven’t calculated the calories, because as a rule, I don’t pay attention to calories. So you would have to do that math. But, for a refreshing drink, I add about 1-2 T. shrub to a glass of water, which with the calculating I did, is about 8 calories per T of rhubarb shrub.

Can you make it sugar free? I don’t know. I personally don’t use any artificial sweeteners, because they are nasty, don’t help with stable weight, and have potential harmful side effects. But, this post is not about that! If you make it with just rhubarb (technically not a fruit, so it has no natural sugars) and vinegar, let me know how it goes. I wouldn’t add artificial anything in the making of the shrub.

I hope you try this, if you have rhubarb in your garden or yard!

Your friend,
Anne Dovel - The Fit Quilter