How To Make Homemade Rhubarb Cordial

Have you ever wondered how to make homemade rhubarb cordial?

Each year, we’re treated to an abundance of rosy tinged rhubarb; cut some stalks and they’re quickly replaced with more.

Which sometimes means that we have a glut of it — and there’s only so much rhubarb crumble that one girl can eat!

We recently bought some delicious Rhubarb and Rosehip cordial from our local farmer’s market and suddenly realised that this is exactly what we could be doing with our own rhubarb.

With a little bit of guesswork we managed to create the perfect mix.

The magic ingredients for our homemade rhubarb cordial — just add water!
Photo Credit: The Listed Home.
homemade rhubarb cordial
Sunshine is optional ;)
Photo Credit: The Listed Home.
homemade rhubarb cordial
Freshly picked and waiting to be transformed!
Photo Credit: The Listed Home.

Here’s how to make your own delicious homemade rhubarb cordial.

How To Make 

You’ll need:

  • 500ml water
  • 500g of golden caster sugar
  • The juice of 1 large orange plus the zest and some of the rind
  • The juice of 1 lemon plus the zest
  • 6 stalks of fresh rhubarb

The method is deliciously straightforward too! Super simple and very quick.

Chop the rhubarb into nice chunks then boil it up in a pan with the orange and lemon juice, plus the zest and rind, until the rhubarb is soft and breaking up.

Then add the sugar. My preference is golden caster because it has a lovely caramel flavour but any would do — I used plain old granulated the first time and that worked nicely too.

Bubble the mixture until the sugar has completely dissolved.

Leave to cool then strain* the mix into a bottle or jug.

*We couldn’t be bothered to wait for it to strain though a muslin. If you did have the patience for this, you’d be rewarded with a beautiful clear liquid. We just used a sieve and — as a result — our cordial is cloudy.

But hey — it still tastes amazing!!!

NB: Life’s too short for waiting around for homemade rhubarb cordial to strain through a cloth! MUCH nicer to be sat in the garden drinking it :)

Serve with plain water, sparking water or — ahem — Prosecco (depending on what time of day it is). And a liberal helping of ice.

Or you can even turn it in to an amazing cocktail!!

The Taste of Summer

rhubarb9
Delicious homemade rhubarb cordial
Photo Credit: The Listed Home.
rhubarb7
Photo Credit: The Listed Home.

How Long Will It Keep?

I suppose (as this is a recipe) I should be able to tell you exactly how long to keep the cordial for, but my boy and I haven’t managed to keep any for longer than two days (greedy goblins). 

We’ve tried to hazard a guess and we reckon that a week — in the fridge — would be a fair estimate.

One last thing I should mention! The strained rhubarb makes THE most amazing compote. Perfect when served with creamy greek yoghurt or ice-cream. Pop it in a sealed tub in the fridge and it will stay good for a week or so.

If you can manage to keep it that long ;)

Plus, if you’re feeling like you’d like something a little more ‘substantial’ — for want of a better word — why not make Rhubarb, Strawberry and Ginger Eton Mess? This lovely recipe is a twist on a classic and absolutely delicious.

A little Bit Of History

My grandad — who sadly passed  away a few years ago — was a really keen gardener.

His vegetable plot was long and wide but the soil quality poor and jet black.

Nan and grandad’s house was built near a coal mine and the earth in his garden was almost like coal dust; I’ve never seen anything like it before, or since. You’d almost think that it would be too arid to sustain the growth of any plant life but year in, year out, my grandad grew the most wonderful runner beans, beetroot and rhubarb.

Whenever we went to visit, we’d always end up taking home a bag of whatever was in season; plus a jar of my nana‘s marmalade, pickled beetroot or pickled onions.

For which she was legendary.

So when grandad died and the house had to be sold one of the things I wanted to take — as a memento — was a rhubarb plant .

We have it in our garden now and my grandad would be so proud to see it growing there.

Homemade Rhubarb Cordial
This year’s crop of runner beans; grown from the seeds of my grandad’s original bean plants!
Photo Credit: The Listed Home.
Homemade Rhubarb Cordial
Some of grandad’s rhubarb, happily growing in our own veggie plot
Photo Credit: The Listed Home.
Homemade Rhubarb Cordial
Fresh rosy stalks, waiting to be picked :)
Photo Credit: The Listed Home.

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Homemade Rhubarb Cordial

Homemade Rhubarb Cordial

Yield: 500ml
Prep Time: 20 minutes
Cook Time: 10 minutes
Total Time: 30 minutes

This gorgeous cordial is one of the best ways to use up a glut of rhubarb in the garden. Really easy to make and tastes delicious!

Ingredients

  • 500ml water
  • 500g of golden caster sugar
  • The juice of 1 large orange plus the zest and some of the rind
  • The juice of 1 lemon plus the zest
  • 6 stalks of fresh rhubarb

Instructions

    1. Chop the rhubarb into nice chunks then boil it up in a pan with the orange and lemon juice, plus the zest and rind, until the rhubarb is soft and breaking up.
    2. Then add the sugar. My preference is golden caster because it has a lovely caramel flavour but any would do — I used plain old granulated the first time and that worked nicely too.
    3. Bubble the mixture until the sugar has completely dissolved.
    4. Leave to cool then strain the mix into a bottle or jug.

Notes

We couldn't be bothered to wait for it to strain though a muslin. If you did have the patience for this, you'd be rewarded with a beautiful clear liquid. We just used a sieve and — as a result — our cordial is cloudy. But hey — it still tastes amazing!!!

Life's too short for waiting around for homemade rhubarb cordial to strain through a cloth! MUCH nicer to be sat in the garden drinking it :)

Serve with plain water, sparking water or — ahem — Prosecco (depending on what time of day it is). And a liberal helping of ice.

Or you can even turn it in to an amazing gin and rhubarb cocktail!!

Caro Davies editor of The Listed Home
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Caro Davies is a former art-director turned writer and content-creator, and editor behind UK lifestyle blog The Listed Home. She writes about home-related topics, from interiors and DIY to food and craft. The Listed Home has been featured in various publications, including Ideal Home, Grazia, and Homes & Antiques magazines.

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102 thoughts on “How To Make Homemade Rhubarb Cordial”

    • It’s SO delicious Cat — I was over the moon with it! We also created a cocktail with it — I shall be posting about that later in the week :)

  1. I love that you took your Grandad’s rhubarb plant – food can evoke such lovely memories. These photos are gorgeous – and you are right – there is some gorgeous bokeh there! Thank you SO much for linking up to #iotw, great to have you here xx

    • Funnily enough, we tok more than the rhubarb. His lovely old shed — that he built himself in the 1940s — was being demolished so we bought home the bits we could salvage and now it forms our raised beds!!

      That’s an entirely different blog post though ;) Thanks so much for hosting — I hope I can join in again :)

    • It’s FAB honestly!! The one we bought from the farmer’s market was so expensive. This cost next to nothing to make and was just as delicious :)

  2. oh wow! this looks amazing, think i might have to give this a try.

    thanks for hosting #twinkytuesday

  3. Wonder if it would be good with vodka? I am not sure what Prosecco is. But this looks like it would be delicious. What a beautiful memory you have of your grandparents growing in your garden. I wanted a rose bush of my grandmas after she passed but my aunt (who got the house) said no. So now I have planted rose bushes everywhere and every single one that blooms reminds me of her. Thank so much for hosting #TwinklyTuesday.

    • I’ll tell you what — it’s AMAZING with gin!!! ;) We made a cocktail on the weekend — blog post to follow this week!! I would imagine Vodka would be just as good :) Prosecco is like Champagne (only not grown in the Champagne region) fizzy, white wine. Lush with rhubarb cordial!! ;)

  4. We kept tulip bulbs from my grandads house when he died. It’s a lovely idea! That cordial sounds lush. I used to eat rhubarb raw as a child. I bet it was drank so quickly and prosecco? Yea!!! Xx #twinklytuesday

    • So nice to have a lasting reminder isn’t it? The cordial IS lush!! I wasn’t able to give an exactly time on how long to keep it for cos it doesn’t last longer than a couple of days in our house :)

  5. What a clever idea, I would never have considered making my own compote!! We will finally have a garden in a few weeks and I really want to try growing things. Maybe herbs to begin with but love the idea of having my own little patch xx

  6. Love this! We have rhubarb in our garden too! Usually use it for a crumble, but I am going to try this, fabulous! xxx #twinklytuesdays

    • Aah Ellie — we’ve been eating crumble for YEARS and trying to think of ‘other’ things to do with the rhubarb!! To be honest, we can’t get enough of this cordial! It’s SUCH a fab way of using it :)

    • That’s exactly how I was feeling about it!! There’s only so much pie or crumble you can eat without getting a little fed up — but this cordial is AMAZING!! :) So delicious. And we made a cocktail with it too!! Recipe to come this week ;)

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