Preheat oven to 350°F. Line an 8-inch square baking pan with parchment paper.
Prepare the fruit mixture: Stir granulated sugar and cornstarch together in a small bowl. In a larger bowl, combine strawberries and rhubarb, then add lemon juice and almond extract. Toss to combine. Sprinkle fruit with sugar/cornstarch mix. Toss again and set aside.
Prepare the crust: In another bowl, stir together oats, oat flour, ground almonds, brown sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Add softened butter and mix with a fork or your hands until it becomes a crumble-like mixture. Stir in egg until well combined and mixture becomes sticky.
Assemble: Spill about two-thirds of the crumble crust into the parchment-lined pan, pressing down to create a firm base. Spoon fruit mixture evenly over top. Sprinkle remaining crumble over fruit layer.
Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes, or until top is slightly browned. Once cooled, lift parchment from pan and cut into squares or bars.
Strawberry Rhubarb Crumble Squares
Ingredients
For the fruit mixture:
1 ½ cups fresh strawberries, sliced
1 ½ cups fresh rhubarb, sliced
½ cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons corn starch
1 tablespoon lemon juice
½ teaspoon almond extract
For the base and topping:
2 cups rolled oats
1 cup oat flour
1 cup ground almonds
¾ cup brown sugar, packed
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
¼ teaspoon kosher salt
⅔ cup butter, at room temperature
1 egg, beaten
Directions
Preheat oven to 350°F. Line an 8-inch square baking pan with parchment paper.
Prepare the fruit mixture: Stir granulated sugar and cornstarch together in a small bowl. In a larger bowl, combine strawberries and rhubarb, then add lemon juice and almond extract. Toss to combine. Sprinkle fruit with sugar/cornstarch mix. Toss again and set aside.
Prepare the crust: In another bowl, stir together oats, oat flour, ground almonds, brown sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Add softened butter and mix with a fork or your hands until it becomes a crumble-like mixture. Stir in egg until well combined and mixture becomes sticky.
Assemble: Spill about two-thirds of the crumble crust into the parchment-lined pan, pressing down to create a firm base. Spoon fruit mixture evenly over top. Sprinkle remaining crumble over fruit layer.
Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes, or until top is slightly browned. Once cooled, lift parchment from pan and cut into squares or bars.
Strawberry Rhubarb Crumble Squares
5 / 5. 1
Sweet strawberries and tangy rhubarb baked with a crumbly mix of oats, almonds and brown sugar…
These STRAWBERRY RHUBARB CRUMBLE SQUARES are superb!
A few years back, we posted this recipe for BERRY-PECAN CRUMBLE SQUARES. Then a few months later we crafted this hugely popular STRAWBERRY-RHUBARB CRISP. As often happens, we got thinking, “Hmmm, what if we combined the two?” Well, the results say it all; these STRAWBERRY-RHUBARB CRUMBLE SQUARES are the summer’s sweetest sensation.
Safe to say that we here at WATC love the combination of strawberries and rhubarb—it’s one of our absolute favourite pairings. Other recipes that showcase this perfect balance of sweet and tangy include our STRAWBERRY-RHUBARB CAKE, this easy-to-make CRISP RECIPE, a GALETTE, this jewel-toned JELLY RECIPE and then our homemade STRAWBERRY-RHUBARB ICE CREAM that fans just can’t get enough of. More about that ice cream in a bit.
Here are some tips on making STRAWBERRY-RHUBARB CRUMBLE SQUARES:
INGREDIENTS
The above photo of the ingredients shows how easy this dessert recipe is, but only tells half the story. We have our usual suspects of fresh strawberries, tangy rhubarb, granulated sugar and lemon juice. It also reveals our secret flavour booster: almond extract. Add in some cornstarch as the thickening agent, plus a buttery crumble base, and that’s it. That topping is already assembled in this photo, but the exact ingredients have their own dedicated pic a little further down in this post.
FRESH STRAWBERRIES
This baked good recipe gets top marks for putting two seasonal favourites to good use: fresh strawberries and rhubarb. For best results, we suggest purchasing or picking locally grown strawberries. Usually in season from mid-June to late July, look for berries that are plump and firm with bright green caps. The berries themselves should be a bright red colour with no white or yellow patches.
RHUBARB
Rhubarb is an herbaceous perennial, classified as a vegetable though most often treated as a fruit in culinary applications. Only the vibrant, tart, celery-like stalks are edible, so make sure to discard the toxic leaves. Look for field-grown rhubarb from late May to the end of July. Pro tip! We suggest using only fresh rhubarb for this recipe. Using frozen rhubarb may add excess liquid to the filling, causing the squares to become soggy. Trust us, no one wants that!
THE CRUMBLE TOPPING INGREDIENTS
Here’s the more detailed photo of the ingredients needed to make the crumble crust and topping for these STRAWBERRY-RHUBARB CRUMBLE SQUARES. Though similar to the topping used in our PECAN-BERRY SQUARES, there are a few changes. First, we used dark brown sugar instead of golden yellow sugar to give the squares pleasing caramel notes. Next, we swapped the pecans for ground almonds, sometimes referred to as almond flour or almond meal. This helps the almond extract flavouring linger a bit longer. We also used the oat flour instead of whole wheat flour, plus rolled oats, a pinch of kosher salt, cinnamon, egg and butter, all lending to the pleasant richness of the topping and giving it the hallmark crumble texture.
MAKING THE BASE AND TOPPING
One of our favourite things about this recipe is that the base for these squares is also used as the topping—no added steps required. Make sure to watch this VIDEO where we show how to make this mixture by hand instead of using a food processor. Fear not, it’s easy. After making it, just remember you’ll be using approximately 2/3 of the quantity to create the base. Reserve the remaining 1/3 to crumble over the fresh fruit mixture. No need to pull out a kitchen scale to measure those quantities; eyeballing it will work fine.
ASSEMBLING THE SQUARES
Assembling the squares could not be easier. Line a square metal baking pan with parchment paper and spill in 2/3 of the oat mixture. Push down into an even layer to form the base. During the testing of this recipe, I found using a flat measure or spoon did not work; the mixture stuck to it and wouldn’t stay down in the pan, arrgh! Pushing the coarse crumbs down with just my fingers worked like a charm.
FRESH FRUIT LAYER
Once the base layer is in, the next step is to add the fruit mixture. For best results, begin by mixing the granulated sugar and cornstarch together in a small bowl. Then, in a large bowl, toss the rhubarb with those juicy strawberries and add the lemon juice and almond extract before sprinkling with the sugar mixture. Toss to coat, then spill this fruit mixture onto the base in the pan, spreading it out in an even layer.
CRUMBLE TOPPING
The final step before baking is to top with the remaining crumble mixture. Again, try to disperse it evenly over the surface. We found the quantities worked perfectly and we love how you could still see the strawberries and rhubarb peaking out between the crumb mixture.
BAKE
Baking these CRUMBLE SQUARES is also easy. Our 30-minute bake time is spot on, as you’ll notice the fruit mixture bubbling up in the crumb topping, which will take on a lovely, golden brown colour. Additionally, no need to rotate the pan in the oven. These STRAWBERRY-RHUBARB CRUMBLE SQUARES will bake nice and even.
CUT AND SERVE
Not to wreck it for you, but these squares do need to cool before you enjoy them. They don’t need to be cold, but set enough that you’re able to lift the parchment from the pan without incident. Once the square is safely lifted from the pan, you can pull the parchment paper down slightly and cut into 16 smaller portions.
By all means, if you’d prefer strawberry rhubarb bars, go for it—they’ll taste the same, HA! If you have leftovers, store them in an airtight container at room temperature for up to three days. Refrigerate beyond that, but honestly, they never last that long.
WHO WANTS ICE CREAM?
When we were setting up the beauty shots for this recipe, I thought to place them on little dessert napkins as a grab-and-go snack. Then I thought, “What if you want to serve these for dessert? Well, I can do whipped cream, for sure! What about vanilla ice cream? Yummy!” But then I remembered, I’d made our famous STRAWBERRY-RHUBARB ICE CREAM days before… whoop, there it is! Lemme just say, having served these STRAWBERRY-RHUBARB CRUMBLE SQUARES with our STRAWBERRY-RHUBARB ICE CREAM is the way to go. Everyone absolutely loved them!
PIN IT!
Before you go to make this squares recipe or the ice cream, we do ask one favour: don’t forget to SHARE! Please PIN it to a favourite weekend baking or dessert board on Pinterest. After that, please send some love our way and subscribe to our monthly newsletter HERE, where we share our top recipes and give a sneak peek at upcoming posts. You’ll also receive Gather, our mid-month missive focused on ideas to entertain family and friends.
These STRAWBERRY-RHUBARB CRUMBLE SQUARES are the sweet treat your whole family will love!
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Ingredients
For the fruit mixture:
1 ½ cups fresh strawberries, sliced
1 ½ cups fresh rhubarb, sliced
½ cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons corn starch
1 tablespoon lemon juice
½ teaspoon almond extract
For the base and topping:
2 cups rolled oats
1 cup oat flour
1 cup ground almonds
¾ cup brown sugar, packed
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
¼ teaspoon kosher salt
⅔ cup butter, at room temperature
1 egg, beaten
Directions
Preheat oven to 350°F. Line an 8-inch square baking pan with parchment paper.
Prepare the fruit mixture: Stir granulated sugar and cornstarch together in a small bowl. In a larger bowl, combine strawberries and rhubarb, then add lemon juice and almond extract. Toss to combine. Sprinkle fruit with sugar/cornstarch mix. Toss again and set aside.
Prepare the crust: In another bowl, stir together oats, oat flour, ground almonds, brown sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Add softened butter and mix with a fork or your hands until it becomes a crumble-like mixture. Stir in egg until well combined and mixture becomes sticky.
Assemble: Spill about two-thirds of the crumble crust into the parchment-lined pan, pressing down to create a firm base. Spoon fruit mixture evenly over top. Sprinkle remaining crumble over fruit layer.
Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes, or until top is slightly browned. Once cooled, lift parchment from pan and cut into squares or bars.
Until Canada Day
