Rhubarb Cake with Streusel

 Rhubarb Cake with Streusel (Crumbles)

I had leftover rhubarb from my last cake (a sponge bottom with baiser on top), so I decided to try a simply crumb cake with it. 

Recipe cake bottom:

• 150 g flour
• 40 g corn starch
• 60 g sugar
• 120 g butter
• 1 egg
• 1 pinch baking powder
• 1 dash of rum
• vanilla sugar

Recipe streusel topping:

• 75 g flour
• 25 g ground almonds
• 50 g sugar
• 50 g butter
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• vanilla sugar

I made the streusel topping ahead and put it in the fridge to cool down. 

To make the bottom dough, I beat the butter sugar and egg, then added in the baking powder, vanilla sugar, and rum. The "dash" slipped my hand a little and it turned out to be quite a large dash which made the dough rather soft. I decided to simply go with it and added the flour and corn starch. The dough went into a 20? (21?) cm round baking pan and then in the fridge.

Preheating the oven to 355. Then I washed and cut up the rhubarb (about 350g). I have stopped peeling rhubarb - it is unnecessary for taste or consistency and looks much better with the extra color. It seemed like there could be more fruit, so I added two huge strawberries.

The rhubarb strawberry mixture went on top of the cake bottom. I distributed one heaping tablespoon of vanilla pudding powder on top of that and then added the streusel. Baked for 40 min.

The cake turned out great. The bottom is a short but light thing that seems impossible - like a mix between an airy sponge and a shortbread. I wonder if the big dash of rum made this happen and how it would have tasted with a small splash of vanilla instead... The strawberry complements the rhubarb and the streusel are yummy. Not sure what the vanilla pudding powder did - my thought was to possibly prevent some sogginess, but unsure if that makes a difference. If anything it probably should have been either mixed with the fruit or below it. The cake tastes amazing with a side of vanilla ice cream.