A Rhubarb Bellini for Every Brunch, All Spring

Each Thursday, Emily Vikre (a.k.a. fiveandspice) will be sharing a new way to love breakfast—because breakfast isn't just the most important meal of the day. It's also the most awesome.

Today: Your brunch cocktail routine just got a springtime facelift. 

I can’t believe I’ve barely written about rhubarb breakfasts when rhubarb is one of my favorite things in the whole wide world. I wait for the rhubarb plants to pop up each spring with the tense excitement of a child waiting for Christmas morning. And it’s not because rhubarb is rare here: It grows like a weed (it even grows in the woods), and every house in Minnesota comes with a rhubarb plant (or several). It’s as if one is included in every homebuyer’s agreement—or any worth signing, in my mind. I was at a bit of a loss the first spring outside of Minnesota, when there was no rhubarb outside my backdoor. The concept of buying rhubarb at the grocery store never stopped confusing me.

Happily for my rhubarb needs, I’m back living in Minnesota. I can attend the rhubarb festival my town hosts in June, and there’s a veritable rhubarb farm growing along the edge of our garage. I’m finally one of those people I was always jealous of, one of those people who has more rhubarb than they quite know what to do with—well, almost more. When it comes down to it, I think I’ll manage.

More: When your rhubarb craving just won't quit.

Rhubarb makes almost any breakfast food happy, particularly baked ones where the bracingly sour stalks are tamed by sugar and softened by heat into sweet-tart jammy bits. Make rhubarb muffins, tarts, buckle, coffee cake, crumble, curd, and pop tarts—you’ll be happy you did. But also save some stalks to make rhubarb syrup so you can create this sparkly, Bellini-inspired brunch number that also moonlights as a pre-dinner treat in my house. 

I blend raw rhubarb stalks with sugar and hot water to make an easy syrup that preserves the floral flavor of fresh rhubarb while still toning down its bite. Use as much or as little of the syrup as you like, top with Prosecco or any dry sparkling wine, and you’re ready for bridal showers, tea parties, picnics in the park, or any old Saturday.

Rhubarb Bellini

Makes 1 1/2 cups of syrup and 10 to 12 drinks

8 ounces fresh rhubarb, chopped into 1/2-inch pieces
1 cup sugar (this makes for a relatively non-tart syrup. If you like it tart, use 3/4 cup)
1 cup boiling water
Prosecco (or another dry sparkling wine), chilled 

See the full recipe (and save and print it) here.

Photos by Emily Vikre