Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp!!

Oh goodness.  It was sooooo gooood!!  I made two!
First thing, there was so much fresh produce at the Dupont Farmer's market this week.  Several stands had rhubarb.  I've seen it before, but I've never actually tried to cook with it.  It's intimidating!  It's scary looking!  The only thing I've ever had that was that shade of fuchsia was kool-aid.  
Well, I bought some.  A pound.  
The market also had some magnificent berries.  Rasberries, blackberries, strawberries!! Such a good season for them this year!  Perhaps it was the mild winter.  I've never been a huge fan of berries, simply because it's hard to find that perfectly sweet berry with a little zing at the end.  Usually they're more tart than sweet.  But this year?! Decadent.  
So, I had rhubarb and I had strawberries.  PIE time!
At first it was going to be just rhubarb, but every reference I found on the interwebz said they needed a TON of sugar!  Sugar is delicious, but I try not to use too much of it.  
Enter the strawberries.  As I said, this spring, they are all soooo sweet! Why not let them provide most of the sweetness I needed!
So I chopped everything up into half-inch pieces and macerated it all with about a quarter cup of sugar.  I zested a half a lemon and squeezed the juice into the berries too.  
OOOOOh, let me tell you, it smelled so good! Like summer!
I mixed it all up and added 2 five-finger-pinches of potato starch--mixed it up again, and put it in the fridge for a few hours.  
Later on, when I got home from kickball, all I wanted was some cobbler.  
Ehhh, I was tired, sunburnt, and feeling lazy.  So I decided against the cobbler, and went with a crisp instead. Ohhh, it's way easier than making a pie crust. 


Easy Crisp Topping
1c flour
1/2c oatmeal
1/2c brown sugar
three-finger pinch of salt
1t vanilla
10T cold butter, cubed
1-2T cold water


The crisp topping is easy, I used quick cook, steel cut oats (super healthy)
Throw the dry ingredients into a food processor, and when the oats go all powdery, toss in the vanilla and butter and add a tablespoon of water slowly.  Pulse it until it it gets pea-sized crumbles.  It should look like crumbly soil.


When the oven is preheated to 350, dump the macerated fruit (and all it's juices) into a baking dish, and cover the top completely with the crumbly stuff, concealing every bit of fruit.  
*Sometimes I chop up some more fresh strawberries and toss them in with the fruit mixture right before baking. It makes for different textures!
Bake it for 30 min on a baking sheet and VOILA!!  
Delicious crisp!
Let it cool for 5 min or so, and serve it with french vanilla ice cream (My personal fave is the 365 from Whole Foods).
OooOOOooo, the piping hot crisp topped with ice cold vanilla ice cream!  Diviiiine!


Try it!  It's easy and delicious!