As Strong As Soup

Rhubarb is a wonderful thing in desserts, cakes and a number of savoury dishes and there's some excellent forced rhubarb around at the moment. But what happens when you have rhubarb but you just can't face eating yet another rhubarb crumble? Well, I make rhubarb vodka. It's an extremely pleasing drink when chilled and sipped on its own but it's even nicer in a cocktail. The good news is that it's easy to make at home. At least, it is if you make it this way. There are more complex recipes, but I'm happy to keep it simple.  Start by finding some good rhubarb and then this is all you need to do: For a 700 ml bottle of decent, neutral vodka, you'll need around 400 g of prepared rhubarb: just chop the cleaned stalks into small pieces and add them to a sterilised jar with a tight seal. Pour over the vodka. At this point, you need to decide how sweet the resulting drink should be. For average, freshly-picked rhubarb I'd recommend 4 - 6 tablespoons of caster su...