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Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp

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Gorgeous red fruit bubbling away beneath a crunchy oat streusel topping — this strawberry rhubarb crisp is one of the easiest and best desserts I know.

how to make rhubarb crisp

Perfect for a spring or early summer evening, this strawberry rhubarb crisp is one of the easiest and best desserts I know. Serve it warm from the oven topped with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Leftovers are delicious with your morning coffee, too. Heads up: while fruit desserts like this one tend to be flexible, be sure to keep the ratio of rhubarb to strawberries the same. If you add more strawberries — which I know is tempting! — you’ll end up with fruit soup, as strawberries release a ton of juice. For seasonal fruit crisp variations, see my summer peach crisp and autumn apple pecan crisp.

What You’ll Need To Make Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp

Crisp ingredients including corn starch, vanilla, and oats.

If you’ve never cooked with rhubarb, now is the time to start! Technically, it’s a vegetable but you treat it like fruit. It’s very tart but when you add a little sugar and cook it down, it becomes deliciously sweet, like berries. To prepare it for this recipe, trim the leaves (they should not be eaten) and rough ends and wash the stalks, then cut them into 1/2-inch pieces.

How To Make Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp

Bowl of fruit with sugar and cornstarch.

Quarter the strawberries and combine them with the rhubarb, sugar, cornstarch and vanilla. Stir until the fruit is evenly coated with the sugar mixture, and the sugar mixture is no longer white.

Fruit coated with a sugar mixture.

Transfer the fruit mixture to a 2-quart baking dish (no need to butter it) and set aside while you prepare the topping.

Baking dish full of rhubarbs and strawberries.

In the bowl of a food processor, combine the flour, brown sugar, granulated sugar and salt.

Dry ingredients in a food processor.

Process until well combined, about 30 seconds. Add the cold butter.

Butter cut onto dry ingredients in a food processor.

Pulse until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs, with a few pea-sized clumps of butter within.

Mixture resembling coarse crumbs in a food processor.

Transfer to a medium bowl and stir in the oats and chopped pecans.

Oats, pecans, and processed mixture in a bowl.

Stir to combine.

Spoon mixing oats, nuts, and more in a bowl.

Spoon the topping evenly over the fruit without packing it down.

Fruit mixture topped with crisp topping in a baking dish.

Bake for 45-55 minutes, until the fruit is bubbling around the edges and the topping is golden brown. Cool for 20 minutes before serving, then spoon into shallow bowls and serve with vanilla ice cream.

Baked strawberry rhubarb crisp in a blue dish.

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Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp

Gorgeous red fruit bubbling away beneath a crunchy oat streusel topping — this strawberry rhubarb crisp is one of the easiest and best desserts I know.

Servings: 6-8
Prep Time: 20 Minutes
Cook Time: 50 Minutes
Total Time: 1 Hour 10 Minutes

Ingredients

For the Filling

  • 1 pound rhubarb stalks, trimmed and sliced ½-inch thick
  • ½ pound strawberries, hulled and quartered
  • ½ cup granulated sugar
  • 1½ tablespoons cornstarch
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the Topping

  • ¾ cup all-purpose flour, spooned into measuring cup and leveled-off with a knife
  • ½ cup packed light brown sugar
  • 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch cubes
  • ¾ cup old fashioned rolled oats
  • ½ cup chopped pecans
  • Lightly sweetened whipped cream or vanilla ice cream, for serving (optional)

Instructions

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F.

For the Filling

  1. In a large bowl, combine the rhubarb, strawberries, sugar, cornstarch, and vanilla. Stir until the fruit is evenly coated with the sugar mixture, and the sugar mixture is no longer white.
  2. Transfer the fruit mixture to a 2-quart or 8-inch baking dish (no need to butter it) and set aside while you prepare the topping.

For the Topping

  1. In the bowl of a food processor, combine the flour, brown sugar, granulated sugar and salt. Process until well combined, about 30 seconds. Add the cold butter and pulse until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs, with a few pea-sized clumps of butter within. Transfer to a medium bowl and stir in the oats and chopped pecans.
  2. Spoon the topping evenly over the fruit without packing down. Bake for 45-55 minutes, until the fruit is bubbling around the edges and the topping is golden brown. Cool for 20 minutes before serving. Spoon into shallow bowls and serve with vanilla ice cream.
  3. Note: If your baking dish is shallow, place it on top of a foil-lined sheet pan to catch any spills that might bubble over the edges.
  4. Note: Don't be tempted to increase the strawberries in the recipe, or you'll end up with fruit soup (they release a lot of juice).
  5. Freezer-Friendly Instructions: The crisp can be frozen tightly covered for up to 3 months. Before serving, reheat it, uncovered, in a 300°F oven until heated through and crisp on top.

Nutrition Information

Powered by Edamam

  • Per serving (8 servings)
  • Calories: 332
  • Fat: 14g
  • Saturated fat: 6g
  • Carbohydrates: 49g
  • Sugar: 32g
  • Fiber: 3g
  • Protein: 4g
  • Sodium: 81mg
  • Cholesterol: 23mg

This website is written and produced for informational purposes only. I am not a certified nutritionist and the nutritional data on this site has not been evaluated or approved by a nutritionist or the Food and Drug Administration. Nutritional information is offered as a courtesy and should not be construed as a guarantee. The data is calculated through an online nutritional calculator, Edamam.com. Although I do my best to provide accurate nutritional information, these figures should be considered estimates only. Varying factors such as product types or brands purchased, natural fluctuations in fresh produce, and the way ingredients are processed change the effective nutritional information in any given recipe. Furthermore, different online calculators provide different results depending on their own nutrition fact sources and algorithms. To obtain the most accurate nutritional information in a given recipe, you should calculate the nutritional information with the actual ingredients used in your recipe, using your preferred nutrition calculator.

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Comments

  • Hi Jenn.
    I am looking forward to making this for Thanksgiving.
    What would you suggest is the best result to prepare ahead of time. Do what you said and bake it, then freeze, or prepare up to the part of cooking (a few days ahead) and then bake? I just don’t want the topping to be soggy.
    Secondly, can you confirm that 1 pound equals 4 cups?
    Thanks,
    Jackie

    • — Jackie S. on October 5, 2023
    • Reply
    • Hi Jackie, I’d bake it before freezing. Just be sure to reheat so the top can crisp up again. And when you slice the rhubarb, the volume should fill approximately 4 (measuring) cups. The sliced strawberries would be the equivalent of about 1-3/4 cups. Hope that helps and you enjoy!

      • — Jenn on October 5, 2023
      • Reply
      • Yes, this helps a great deal. Thank you so much!
        Love your recipes Jenn and you are my “go to”

        • — Jackie S. on October 6, 2023
        • Reply
  • This was the BOMB!! I added a bit more rhubarb and strawberries and it was perfect! This will be on our Thanksgiving table!

    • — Lynne R James on September 12, 2023
    • Reply
  • I just made this beautiful cake. It was so easy to put together, and I’m waiting for it to come out of the oven. My only question is about high altitude baking. I live at 7,000 ft so I’m just going to wait and see. I added a little extra flour and let it Go! I’ll let you know when I get the results! It was really a nice, easy recipe for beginners to make.

    • — Elizabeth S. on September 9, 2023
    • Reply
  • Love it. Made it twice in one week.

    • — Janet on August 15, 2023
    • Reply
  • Your strawberry rhubarb crisp is to die for. So easy to make and so delicious. Your recipe is very easy to follow and very attractive with all the pics.

    • — Carol Ford on August 3, 2023
    • Reply
  • can you use frozen rhubarb in this recipe?

    • — Karen Blaak on July 15, 2023
    • Reply
    • Yep, using frozen rhubarb is fine — just defrost it first and drain any excess liquid. Hope you enjoy!

      • — Jenn on July 17, 2023
      • Reply
    • Amazing

      • — Steve on August 6, 2023
      • Reply
  • My family loved the taste of this crisp to the extent they suggested that the crisp was good enough to sell at our local farmer’s market. Thank you for sharing this recipe that will now become a family treasure!
    – Christine
    Edmonton, Canada

    • — Christine P. on July 4, 2023
    • Reply
  • I am a new fan of rhubarb and this recipe is terrific. It is sweeter the second day than right out of the oven. Doubling the recipe and baking it in smaller portions I have left over topping so have tp make more for the freezer. No problem! Per usual, I replace vanilla with King Arthur Baking’s Fiori di Siciia at 50% of the amount for vanilla.

    • — Chip on July 3, 2023
    • Reply
  • Hi Jenn,

    Huge fan and lover of ALL of your recipes! Is it possible to use the same proportions from this crisp recipe to make a deep dish strawberry rhubarb pie instead? I was hoping to try out your pie crust recipe. Thanks for the help!

    • — Maura on July 2, 2023
    • Reply
    • So glad you like the recipes! 💗
      Unfortunately, I don’t think this would be a good pie filling — I suspect it would be too soupy. Sorry!

      • — Jenn on July 3, 2023
      • Reply
  • We loved this recipe! We will absolutely make it again. We are not a huge fan of topping, in general, so we doubled the fruit portion, including sugar, vanilla, etc, and kept the topping as the original recipe. It was amazing. 🙂

    • — Juli and daughter on June 30, 2023
    • Reply
  • I’d like to bake this in the morning and bring it to friends for dinner. Would that work well, and should I leave it out until it’s time to serve?

    • — Sona on June 29, 2023
    • Reply
    • Hi Sona, yes, that’s perfectly fine. I’d leave it on the counter and, prior to serving it at your friend’s house, I’d reheat it, uncovered, in a 300°F oven until heated through and crisp on top. Hope everyone enjoys!

      • — Jenn on June 30, 2023
      • Reply
  • Way too much bland topping. Strawberry rhubarb mix is good, maybe add a little lemon juice. I’m off to find a better recipie.

    • — Ben on June 25, 2023
    • Reply
  • I’m not a huge rhubarb fan – it’s a bit too tart for me – but my husband is and he loved this. The crispy topping is delicious. This was my first time using rhubarb and it was super easy. If you have a rhubarb lover in your family, I highly recommend!!

    • — Sally on June 24, 2023
    • Reply
  • Beautiful and delicious! Used sliced almonds in place of pecans in topping, and a bourbon vanilla paste in fruit mixture.

    • — Cindy on June 24, 2023
    • Reply
  • I have made this recipe twice in past month. Both times I increased the recipe but I always maintained the ratio of strawberries to rhubarb. Each time the crisp was absolutely delicious. I will be checking this site in the future for more recipes! Thank you.

    • — Karen L Susac on June 23, 2023
    • Reply
  • This is a lovely early summer dessert. I used frozen rhubarb from a friend’s garden which I drained and patted dry and the crisp was delicious but I think fresh rhubarb probably adds even more flavour.

    • — Fernande on June 23, 2023
    • Reply
  • Delicious and easy. I usually add 1/2 tsp cinnamon to the topping and 1 tsp grated fresh ginger to the fruit.

    • — Darlene Barnes on June 22, 2023
    • Reply
  • Doubled and baked for Memorial Day. Was the perfect ratio of fruit to topping. Thank you for making a note to not be tempted and double the strawberries because of too much juice, was just juicy enough, and not soupy. Thanks Jenn.

    • — ESBmom on June 22, 2023
    • Reply
  • I have not made it yet but I’m excited to because I’m only a beginner

    • — Benjamin Bonnema on June 18, 2023
    • Reply

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