Rhubarb and I have a troubled past. I was in college when I first saw it in stalk form and thought that it was celery gone bad. Then I tried this vegetable in a slice of strawberry-rhubarb pie. The strawberry part of the pie was tasty, but, once I took a bite of a stringy and hard pinkish-green chunk of rhubarb, I was repulsed. Rhubarb fail number one. Fast forward several years and I’m in Southeastern Pennsylvania, with neighbors who grow a variety of uncommon produce. One late spring evening my next-door-neighbor Frank drops off a grocery bag filled with jagged stalks of what appear to be pink celery. Ah, yes. My old nemesis. After instructing me to wash and chop the rhubarb before putting it in a casserole with some water and baking it until soft, he sets off. I do exactly as instructed and create a mouth-puckering sour, mushy dish that even our dog won’t touch. What Frank failed to mention was that I should have added a liberal amount of sugar to …