Jun. 28, 2021
Cooking In Season
Salad Meals to Beat the Heat
In this recipe round up, I have gathered my best and most delicious summer salad meal recipes in one post, for days when it’s too hot to cook!
May 25, 2011
Rhubarb Custard Bars
Rhubarb custard bars are the all-time most popular recipe on my blog, and for good reason. The tart rhubarb plays perfectly against the sweet buttery crust and smooth vanilla custard. To die for!
Rhubarb season just got even more delicious. All because of this great recipe.
Rhubarb Custard Bars are awesome: such a crisp nutty crust married to a sweet, smooth, sliceable custard, and filled to bursting with tart pieces of rhubarb. Excuse me while I drool.
I’d love to claim this recpe as my own. But, while I have tweaked it a little, original recipe honours must go to Ciara Dooley of Kildara Farms. She gave me this recipe almost 10 years ago and I have been using it ever since, a happy and delicious spring ritual. I love rhubarb crisp, too, but Rhubarb Custard Bars are something different and hand-pie-ish.
My kids call these “Rhubarb Pie Things” (Usage: “Mommy, can I have another Rhubarb Pie Thing? Please? I’ve only had two!”). I just call them extra yummy.
Rhubarb Custard Bars
Rhubarb custard bars are the all-time most popular recipe on my blog, and for good reason. The tart rhubarb plays perfectly against the sweet buttery crust and smooth vanilla custard. To die for!
Ingredients
Crust
1-1/4 cup (175 gm) all purpose flour
1/4 cup (35 gm) whole wheat flour (or use all purpose flour here)
½ cup (114 g) unsalted butter, at cool room temperature
½ cup (100 g) white sugar
¼ tsp (1.5 g) salt
Topping
1½ cups (300 g) sugar
3 eggs
5 Tb (44 g) all purpose flour
2 tsp (10 ml) vanilla extract
¼ tsp (1.5 g) salt
¼ cup (60 ml) whipping cream
4 to 5 cups (approx 1½ lbs / 680 g) rhubarb, chopped small
Instructions
Crust
- Preheat oven to 375 F. Butter the bottom and sides of a 9″ x 13″ (approx) metal or glass pan.
- In a large bowl combine all ingredients. Mix with your fingers until the mixture resembles fine crumbs. Butter should be completely incorporated. You can use a food processor for this step, if you like.
- Press crumbs (not too too firmly, but firm enough) into the bottom of the prepared pan. Press a tiny bit up the sides of the pan as well. Place pan on lower-centre rack of the preheated oven. Bake for about 10 to 15 minutes, until golden. Remove from oven and reduce oven heat to 350 F.
Topping
- While the crust is baking, mix the topping ingredients together.
- In a large bowl, mix the sugar, eggs, flour, vanilla, salt, and whipping cream, whisking well to eliminate lumps. Stir in the diced rhubarb.
- Once the crust comes out of the oven, pour the topping over it (the crust should still be warm). Return to the oven and bake for 30-40 minutes, until custard no longer jiggles and toothpick inserted in the middle comes out mostly clean.
- Let cool. Cut into bars. The first bar is hard to cut, but after that, they should be pretty easy to cut.
- Note: Plan to eat these bars up within two days. If you don’t think you can eat them that quickly, cut the recipe in half and bake it in an 8×8-inch square pan.
I make these with a layer of cream cheese on top of the base coat………….delicious
This came just in time Heidi! Jürgen just dumped a load of rhubarb in the kitchen and asked if I’d make him a pie. I said that’s about as likely as him making one for me! I haven’t yet taken your pie class obviously 🙂 This one I can do.
Goodness! I need to make myself some of these! I just happen to have a few stems of rhubarb in my fridge (c/o Saanich Organics) – thanks for such a delicious looking recipe! I can practically taste it already!
P.S. Do you happen to know where I can get whole wheat cake & pastry flour??
Hi Kristy, you can get whole wheat pastry flour at most supermarkets and at the health food store. Supermarkets sell it in those small packages – either Nunweiler’s or Bob’s Red Mill. Health food stores usually sell it bulk, or in packages.
Hi Kristy:
I love this recipe and the next time you make it,
add the rind of two organic oranges…it brightens the flavor immensely.
I’ll have two pieces of those Rhubarb pie “things” please:D
Oh my, this looks yummy! Harvested my rhubard today and just popped a batch of this in the oven. Made the mistake of posting on facebook that I was making your recipe. After popular demand I posted a link to this page 🙂 Thanks for sharing this wonderful piece of goodness with us!!!!
Joella – I’m so happy that you shared my recipe on facebook. I hope it turned out well!
Gah! Those look divine! Rhubarb is so fabulous. Thanks for the recipe. I’m gonna make some 🙂
Half recipe in the oven right now (I *could* eat a full recipe in two days, but probably shouldn’t). Can’t wait to try them!
Thanks for such a tasty recipe, Heidi. I made it with buttermilk instead of whipping cream, and they tasted great.
You’re welcome, Lara! I like the buttermilk idea.
I took these to my son’s baseball game and they disapeared in no time. Now I have to make more. So yummy!!
Thanks Heidi! This turned out really delicious. I’ve just shared some with my bachelor neighbour over the fence! I was going to cut down on the sugar but then remembered how sour rhubarb can be so left well enough alone. I like the idea of adding orange rind and would imagine this recipe would also be nice with other kinds of fruit such as berries.