Rhubarb Crumble with Custard, aka My Favorite Dessert

This has become my all time favorite dessert.  Yes, of all the wonderful desserts that I love, rhubarb crumble is It for me.  The tart rhubarb, sweet and buttery crumble with a tiny hint of cinnamon, and custard poured on top all just come together to make something truly amazing.  It tastes like joy. comfort, love, and well being.  I urge you to try it if you have access to rhubarb and want a really special treat.  Lucky for us, we have a ridiculously huge and robust rhubarb patch!

 

This recipe is from the book Great British Cooking: A Well-Kept Secret by Jane Garmey.  She apparently got the recipe from a nun in cooking class while in school, very cute little story.  I altered it a bit by moving the cinnamon from the filling to the topping, increasing the filling amount by half, increasing the baking temperature, and baking it much longer than the original recipe states.  The book says to bake it for 20 minutes and you'd be crunching your way through raw rhubarb if you made it like that!

 

Rhubarb Crumble with Custard
 

filling:

1 1/2 lbs rhubarb, cut in 3/4 inch pieces

3/4 C sugar

3 Tbsp lemon juice

 

crumble:

1 1/2 C flour

1 1/2 C dark brown sugar

1/4 tsp cinnamon

6 oz cold salted butter, cut into small cubes

 

topping:

warm vanilla custard (I used Bird's custard powder, but you could look up a recipe)

 

Preheat oven to 350.  You do not need to grease the baking dish.

 

Place filling ingredients in a 2 quart baking dish and toss with a spoon to coat.

 

Combine dry ingredients for crumble in bowl and mix well.  Add butter.  Rub mixture together with fingers until the ingredients are well combined and look like wet sand with pea sized clumps.  Sprinkle evenly over filling.

 

Bake for 45 minutes, then check on it and cover with foil if the crumble starts looking like it's browned enough.  Continue baking until rhubarb is tender and bubbly throughout.  It should be bubbly in the center and a fork stuck in should not meet any resistance from the rhubarb.  This will take about an hour and a half total.

 

Let the crumble sit for 10-20 minutes before digging in.  Serve crumble in a bowl with warm custard poured over top.

  

Yield: 8 servings

Secret Recipe Club: Rhubarb Bread

It's Secret Recipe Club time again!  This month, I was assigned the blog BCMom's Kitchen.  The blog is written by Anna.  Anna's approach to the recipes she makes seems pretty in line with my own.  She is a chronic recipe tweaker, loves trying out new recipes, only repeats a recipe if it turned out fabulously, and tends to gravitate towards easier recipes.  My kind of cook!
 
Tastiness abounds on Anna's blog.  She has a ton of recipes that appealed strongly to me, and I will probably make more of her recipes in the future.  I was particularly drawn to her varied selection of rhubarb recipes because to my undying joy, winter has finally left Interior Alaska (though last night I dreamed it snowed again) and my rhubarb plants are working overtime.  The stalks are still pretty small, but big enough to sacrifice a few for springtime tastiness!  Both of her rhubarb muffin recipes look great, as does the rhubarb focaccia (so unique, I'll definitely make this one!), rhubarb pudding cake, and blackberry rhubarb crumble.  Yum!  It was a very close tie between the two, but I decided to make rhubarb bread instead of rhubarb muffins.
 
The rhubarb bread turned out great.  I was drawn to it because I'd never actually seen a rhubarb bread recipe, and I liked that rhubarb was the star of the show instead of having to share the title with another fruit.  The soft, tart little bits of rhubarb were really nice and contrasted well with the sweet, cinnamony goodness of the bread.  One of the loaves went to our neighbors who kindly took care of our pets when we went out of town recently (first time leaving my dogs, it was so hard!), but my husband and I got to devour the other loaf ourselves.  Anna has a very intriguing recipe on the bread page for honey rhubarb butter, which I will try another time.  I just purchased a tub of honey brown sugar cinnamon butter at Sam's Club so wanted to use that on the bread.  Great combo!  I also really liked the taste and crunch of the topping, plus how quick and easy it is to make, so plan to use it in other recipes.  How good does pumpkin bread with crumb topping sound?  Yes, please!
   

  
Rhubarb Bread
 
1 egg
1 C brown sugar
1/2 C canola oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 C buttermilk
2 1/2 C flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
2 C chopped rhubarb
 
for topping:
3 T butter, melted
1/2 C sugar
1/2 C oats
1 tsp cinnamon
  
Preheat oven to 325 and grease two 9 by 5 inch loaf pans.
  
Mix together egg, brown sugar, and oil, then stir in the vanilla extract and buttermilk.  In another bowl, combine flour, salt, baking soda, and cinnamon.  Stir into wet ingredients, then stir in rhubarb.  Divide batter evenly among the two loaf pans.
  
To make the topping, stir brown sugar, oats, and cinnamon into the melted butter, then sprinkle evenly over the loaves.
  
Bake in the preheated oven about 45 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.  Let loaves cool in the pans for 10 minutes, then turn them out onto a cooling rack to finish cooling.
  
Yield: 2 loaves, about 16 servings
  

An InLinkz Link-up