First Rhubarb

The first rhubarb is ready. Our rhubarb is all descended from plants Joel found here when he came to the farm in the late 70's. The place had been abandoned for about 40 years, or since the end of the Depression, when those islanders who had waited it out with no money but plenty to eat, went into town for jobs that the beginning of WWII created. But the rhubarb had persisted. I've been eyeing it for more than a week, wanting to make a rhubarb crisp (remember, Joel does pies, I do crisps) but not wanting to rob the cradle, so to speak. But today I decided it was finally big enough to harvest.
I brought in about 2 pounds and made a crisp. Here's my recipe:

Cut approx. 2# of rhubarb into a 7" x 11" baking pan (a bigger pan would just make a flatter crisp)
Add 1/2 cup sugar (I use evaporated cane juice) and 1/2 cup flour to pan and shake around to coat rhubarb.

For topping:

Melt 1/2 (1 cube) butter, add l c oatmeal, 1 c flour, 1 c brown sugar. Mix lightly with a fork so that it stays crumbly. Cover the rhubarb with this mixture and cook until done. Since I cook on a wood stove and the heat is rarely ever the same I can't say how long in a regular regulated oven. This took a little less than an hour to cook. It's done when the rhubarb is soft.

Add ice cream or whipped cream if you have it. We'll take whatever is left with us to town tomorrow and buy ice cream to have with it.

For those of you on San Juan Island, we will have rhubarb at the market Saturday, which is the first regular weekly market of the season. We'll be back at the courthouse parking lot. Come early if you want rhubarb as we won't have a lot this first time. There'll also be lots of spring greens, purple broccoli, and spring cauliflower.