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Rhubarb & Custard Crumble Pie Bars

P1070428 P1070438Yes, another crumble related recipe. Why? Because that’s my JAM. No, no. Because, that’s the way the cookie crumbles. It’s worrying how quickly these terrible jokes come to me. Or does that make me a quick witted individual? I’ll leave that for you to decide. You don’t have to tell me what conclusion you come to. What a way to start a post eh. It’s only taken me two weeks to attempt to make this, or was it three? Either way, my days off became days on, so the baking just kept being postponed. When it finally came round to my baking day, I was pretty darn excited.

P1070418 P1070416I may have mentioned before that I have a gas oven in my new crib and that I was scared to use it. Well, I banished my fear with my new best friend, the oven thermometer. My previous kitchen utensil best friend was the waffle maker. We’ve not hung out in a while, but we’re still pals. Anyway, before I get any weirder, the O-T helped me keep an eye on the fluctuating temperature resulting in almost perfect crumble pie bars.

P1070419 R&CI’m still trying to figure out roughly what gas mark corresponds to what temperature because the internet and my oven don’t seem to correlate. I’ve lost my train of thought so we’re just gonna jump train and start talking about the next thing that comes to my mind. The weather. I was supposed to go out to meet my Mum for dinner today but I lent my rain coat to this new girl who moved into my house. I assumed she’d be back by the time I had to leave as she went out at about 12ish. Why could I not go out you ask? Well because I don’t own an umbrella or suitable coat. It’s all denim and corduroy over here. After spending all day thinking about what I was going to order, I now have to think about what I am going to cook.
Maybe I’ll just eat these pie bars for dinner…

P1070442 P1070439A pie bar, for those of you who don’t know, is a traybake that is doing it’s very best to be a pie. You have a shortbread base, instead of pastry and then top it with whatever pie filling you want! It’s super easy. It looks like there’s a lot of ingredients and a lot going on with this recipe but you’ll notice there’s no crazy ingredients, unless you think rhubarb is crazy. In which case, there’s ยฃ2 worth of crazy in them. If you don’t like rhubarb, why not use apples instead? They’d work a treat too!

 

Recipe

I came up with this recipe by combing this recipe for Rhubarb & Custard Pie and this one for Pie Bars. The result was incredible. I think combing great things to make one fantastic thing has become my new…thing. I apologise in advance that the ingredients aren’t exactly in order of use. They are organised according to which component of the pie bar they make up!

Serves: 12 bars
Prep Time:30mins
Cooking Time:40-45mins (in total)
Skill Level:This ones takes a bit of concentration.

Equipment
Chopping board
Knife
Non-stick frying pan
Mixing bowls x3
20x25cm baking tin/ brownie tin (lined and greased)

Ingredients
Shortbread Crust
115g unsalted butter (melted)
30g caster sugar
1tsp vanilla essence
pinch of salt
125g plain flour

Rhubarb & Custard Filling
350g rhubarb (cut into bite sized pieces)
100g caster sugar
1 large egg + 1 large egg yolk
1tsp vanilla essence
1tbsp plain flour
284ml single cream (carton)

Crumble Topping
35g rolled oats
30g plain flour
60g demerara sugar
60g unsalted butter (cold, cubed)

Method

  1. Preheat oven to 150c/130c (fan)/Gas 2
  2. Cut rhubarb into bite sized pieces. Using a non-stick frying pan, over med-low heat, heat the rhubarb and half the sugar until the sugar dissolves. Tip into a bowl (with juices) and set aside.
  3. SHORTBREAD CRUST: Mix together melted butter, sugar, vanilla essence, pinch of salt.
  4. Stir in flour and mix until combined.
  5. Pour/empty dough into prepared tin. Press down until entire base of tine is covered (it will be a thin layer).
  6. Bake in oven for 15mins or until golden brown. Set aside.
  7. R & C FILLING: Whilst the short crust is baking, beat together eggegg yolk, what is left of the caster sugarflour and vanilla essence in a mixing bowl.
  8. Gradually whisk in the cream adding a bit at a time, followed by the juice from the cooked rhubarb.
  9. Turn up the oven temperature to 200c/180c(fan)/Gas 6.
  10. CRUST + FILLING: Spoon cooked rhubarb (no juice) over the baked shortbread crust and then pour over cream mix. 
  11. Place in oven and bake for 20mins until custard is slightly set and a thin skin has formed on top.
  12. CRUMBLE TOPPING: Whilst pie is baking, mix together, rolled oats, plain flour and sugar. 
  13. Rub butter cubes to form large/coarse crumbs.
  14. After 20mins of baking, scatter crumble topping over pie and return to oven. Bake for a further 10-15mins until crumble is golden.
  15. Allow to cool slightly before removing from tin and cooling some more.

I CAN’T THINK OF ANYTHING FUNNY TO WRITE ๐Ÿ™

P1070428

Here’s some Jungle for your eyes & ears. I am seeing them next week. Can’t wait for a boogie…

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