FERMENTED RHUBARB SYRUP / CHEONG

Celebrated as a delicious cordial for tea, cookery, and condiments, in this version we purposefully push the recipe into fermentation to make a bottle of rhubarb extract. Cheong is also said to help ward off the common cold and minor illnesses as an alternative medicine. Am I qualified to give such advice? Hell no. But it tastes great and placebo is a powerful tool, so why not give it a go?
Full Recipe:
400g rhubarb
400g sugar or honey
500ml jar
1. Wash and cut the rhubarb into equal sized pieces, then add to a clean jar with the same weight in sugar or honey. What makes this ferment safe is the use of acidic ingredients and daily shaking to disturb the surface of the liquid.
2. Let the sugar dissolve in the rhubarb juices over the next 7 days, shaking the jar daily. You may need to start releasing carbon dioxide pressure after 4-5 days.
3. Continue to age the syrup for 30 days (up to 3 months) before filtering the liquid and bottling.
4. Store in a fridge to preserve the best flavour and colour, where it will keep for up to 6 months.
Troubleshooting:
If your rhubarb syrup doesn’t spontaneously ferment, try adding a little water and stirring it vigorously. High levels of sugar make life hard for microbes, and stirring it introduces oxygen to give them a little boost.
This recipe is usually 0% ABV, but if you add water there’s a chance you’ll make sweet rhubarb wine.
Bonus Recipes:
1. Mix equal parts milk and sparkling water and flavour with rhubarb syrup to taste.
2. For the leftover rhubarb, I baked them, covered, with a small amount of rhubarb syrup for 20 minutes at 180C (355f) to make soft, tangy, rhubarb gum, which I then used as a filling for hazelnut and rye biscuits. Read the pinned comment for the biscuit recipe.
Let’s bring back this absolute classic. I’ve been making it for years before everyone told me it was cheong! Whatever you call it, if you want more inspiration, check out @johnnykyunghwo and his millions of cheong recipes

[@christinelaloba8869]

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