Even though Summer might be winding down, the garden continues to produce. One of these produce items is rhubarb. Lots and lots of rhubarb!
I realize rhubarb is strange and tastes sour. Really sour! Is it a fruit or is it veggie? Rhubarb looks like a relative to Swiss chard, but most of the time it’s hanging out in a pie crust with strawberries. What gives? Rhubarb is like cilantro, licorice and anchovies…you love it or you despise it! But with a little sugar (okay A LOT of sugar) and some spiffying up with friendly fruits like strawberries, rhubarb can be scrumptious. Strawberry-rhubarb crisp…Red Ass Rhubarb wine from South Dakota’s Prairie Berry Winery… and the recipe below for these Strawberry-Rhubarb Cheesecake Shortbread Squares!
Before writing this post, my rhubarb knowledge consisted of what you just read above. But, dear reader, there’s more to this disputed veggie than you know.
- Rhubarb roots were originally used as medicine in ancient China and northern Europe as teas and powders. It’s loaded with vitamin K1 and C, antioxidants, and fiber!
- The baby Dumbo sized leaves are filled with calcium oxalate (oxalic acid), making them poisonous to eat.
- Rhubarb grows best in northern regions and needs a cold winter to hibernate. Sorry to my friends in the South!
- The stalks, ranging from green to scarlet red, can be eaten raw. Most people eat them cooked and with gobs of sugar. Folks have been cooking up rhubarb in jams, tarts, cobblers, fools, crumbles, pies and wine since the 18th century, when sugar became readily available to commoners everywhere.
- According to Merriam-Webster, the word rhubarb is a term used to refer to “a heated dispute or controversy.”
In true Glove Box Eats style, let me virtually whisk you to northern Wyoming. Home to extremely chilly winters where rhubarb thrives, and a truly colorful western cowgirl, who frequently found herself in many rhubarbs–Miss Caroline Lockhart! (Photo: American Heritage Center, #ah002656.)
Caroline Lockhart was born in 1871 Kansas, similar to Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie backdrop. Caroline grew up on the back of a horse in an affluent family. Her wild frontier tendencies and apathetic attitude clashed with the high-society she was expected to mold into. Although she received a formal, high-society education at the Moravian Seminary in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, Caroline ultimately wanted fame, fortune and adventure. Enter Caroline, stage right, the one-time actress and famous stunt girl reporter.
As a Boston Post stunt reporter at the turn of the 20th Century, Caroline went on many adventures–wearing bloomers for a day, sailing out on a sailboat in the middle of a blizzard, packing fireworks, and donning dive gear to go to the bottom of Boston Harbor. The latter event described her as a “plucky girl” and “a mermaid bold.” (Photo: American Heritage Center, Box 7: Caroline Lockhart Papers.)
Caroline earned fame as an author, writing about the wild, untamed West and its colorful characters in seven novels and multiple news articles. In 1904, she traveled to Cody, Wyoming to write a news story on the Blackfoot Indians. Ultimately she fell in love with the area and many men. In 1912, Caroline’s second novel, The Lady Doc, was released to mixed reviews. In it, she gave a scathing account of a frontier woman named Dr. Emma Harpe, who lacked compassion and competence.
In reality, the novel was based on her former friend and Cody physician, Dr. Frances Lane. Through her undercover journalism, Caroline discovered a line of conspiracies between Dr. Lane’s patient care in her shared Bradbury-Lane Hospital in Cody; and the increasing number of burials in the town cemetery. Caroline wrote a caption for the photo below, which reads “Doc (Shady) Lane and me in Cody Minstrel Show.” (Photo: American Heritage Center, Caroline Lockhart Papers, Accession #177, Box 5.) It’s pretty safe to say, this rhubarb ended in a love-her or loathe-her situation.
The same could be said of how the Cody tea-totaling elites felt about Caroline’s eccentric ways. She made fast friends with seedy characters in sketchy places, constantly dug up dirt on conservative local snobs, juggled multiple boyfriends at any given time, and welcomed visitors into her home by introducing them to her house-bobcat “Wampus.” However, Caroline was literally monumental in establishing long-standing events in this Wild West community. (Photo: F.J. Hiscock archives.)
For over 100 years, the annual opening of Yellowstone National Park’s East Entrance gate and road from Cody is looked forward to. It’s a huge springboard for Cody’s tourist-based economy. In 1919, Cody celebrated this occasion with “Entrance Day,” a weekend-long celebration in the fictitious village of Slippery Gulch set up on a usually vacant town lot. The community and visitors looked forward to this event, along with its sordid activities–drinking, gambling, and visiting painted ladies.
In 1920, the Entrance Day committee wanted to expand (and profit from) Entrance Day festivities, by combining it with Cody’s annual 4th of July rodeo. In committee meetings, Caroline voiced that the word rodeo seemed tacky. Additionally, the committee members couldn’t agree on how to pronounce the word, so the Cody Stampede was born. Caroline served as the first Cody Stampede Board President. For 80 years, every July 4th, visitors and competitors have flocked to Wyoming’s northwest corner, watching local and world-famous cowboys and gals compete in events like barrel racing, calf-roping, and bull riding.
If writing, traveling abroad, and chasing men wasn’t enough, in 1920, Caroline also became the editor and publisher of the Cody Enterprise, founded by William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody in 1899. Owning the paper would be another contentious undertaking. Caroline frequently found herself wrapped up in rhubarbs for years to come with town founder L.L. Newton and county prosecuting attorney, Ernest Goppert, Sr. It’s said her non-fiction writing was as lively as her fiction.
A few years earlier, in 1917, Buffalo Bill Cody died. Caroline greatly admired him. So within weeks of his death, she urged the community and Stampede Committee to erect a statue of Buffalo Bill in Cody. She felt this would solidify his prominence in town and add to the allure of future tourists yearning for Buffalo Bill’s Wild West. Gathering the funds and a commissioned artist wasn’t straightforward. But when money and an artist aligned, there was a rhubarb associated with the Buffalo Bill Statue.
In 1923, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, a New York heiress, artist and acquaintance of Buffalo Bill’s niece Mary Jester Allen, was commissioned by the Buffalo Bill Memorial Association to immortalize this western icon atop a horse. When Whitney’s initial sketches were delivered to the Buffalo Bill Memorial Association, the committee felt the horse was too eastern-looking…fat and suitable for polo-playing. It didn’t represent the genuine western horse Cody would have ridden. To fix this problem, the committee shipped Smokey to act as a horse model for the one we see today in Whitney’s statue, The Scout.
A curious fact about this sculpture is Whitney funded part of the $50,000 price tag in its making. This gracious act wasn’t rhubarb-worthy to town folks. Denver, Colorado might have William F. Cody’s body, but the town of Cody had his Irma Hotel, a Whitney statue celebrating the man, and would forever hold an allure of the Old West’s wild mythology.
In 1925, Caroline took on a new adventure. She already earned fame and fortune through six novels. Her fifth novel, The Fighting Shepherdess, was made into a motion picture in 1920, starring actress Anita Stewart. (1920 was a busy year for Caroline!) So at the age of 55, Caroline sold the Cody Enterprise, and went into retirement with then boyfriend, Lou Ericson. Caroline left the comforts of her plush Cody home for a dusty log cabin on a 160-acre homestead in Montana’s Dryhead country. (Photo: Lincoln County News, June 18, 1920.)
Situated on the Wyoming-Montana state line, north of Lovell, Wyoming sits Bighorn Canyon National Recreation Area. In 1925, this now protected property was called the “Dryhead,” a rocky stagecoach trail snaking between the Pryor Mountain’s rugged peaks and Bighorn Canyon’s chasmic depths. Gold miners, ranchers, wild mustangs, cattle thieves and the Crow people called this rugged stretch home. To Caroline, it was heaven. It’s equally impressive from the ground and the air!
Caroline’s L Slash Heart ranch brought her solace and stress. She felt she finally owned a place of her own, where she could become “the Cattle Queen of Montana.” But stress was a constant–hard work, a revolving door of hired hands, constant upgrades needed to run a cattle operation, rhubarbs with her nearest neighbor (Dr. Grosvener Barry at his Hillsboro ranch complex), cattle rustling, and dwindling money. But Caroline’s love of adventure, pluck and sheer stubbornness made living on the ranch from 1926 to 1950 possible. She also finally adjusted to managing one boyfriend–longtime foreman Dave Good.
Road to L Slash Heart Ranch 
Dave Good lived in the green sided office and storage addition. 
Back of Main House 
Inside Main House 
Corrals, Shops and Stables 
The chicken coop was once home to the Hannon family in 1900. 
West View Looking Down on L Slash Heart
Finally at the ages of 79 and 77, Caroline and Dave moved back to Cody. She felt they were too old to run the ranch. Caroline died in 1962, having her ashes scattered over the L Slash Heart ranch. Caroline never married, or had children, but her legacy lives on.
As a final claim of fortune, the Cowgirl Hall of Fame inducted Caroline into its ranks in 2018. Folks interested in western history can hear her voice in an online recording from the University of Wyoming’s American Heritage Center. Hikers enjoy visiting Caroline’s L Slash Heart ranch in Bighorn Canyon NRA. Weary travelers spend the night in her former Cody home, the Lockhart Inn, which is now a bed and breakfast on Cody’s West Strip. The Buffalo Bill Center of the West museum, Whitney’s The Scout statue, and the Cody Stampede Rodeo attract visitors from around the world wanting to make a connection with the Old West.
This blog post barely skims the surface of a vibrant, outspoken woman who was well before her time. Talk about multiple layers! If you’re interested in knowing more about Caroline Lockhart, I highly recommend reading John Clayton’s The Cowboy Girl: The Life of Caroline Lockhart. My layered Strawberry-Rhubarb Cheesecake Shortbread Squares would be delightful to munch on as you read Clayton’s book!
Akin to a Caroline Lockhart novel, the cast of layered characters in these scrumptious squares don’t disappoint. A buttery, brown sugar shortbread crust. Rich, indulgent vanilla cheesecake. Tempting sweet strawberries. Cheeky, plucky rhubarb. Pecan-nutty topping. What could be better?!
When making Strawberry-Rhubarb Cheesecake Shortbread Squares, there’s a few things to making sure the final product is heavenly.
- Fresh or frozen strawberries can be used (see recipe notes).
- Be sure to dice the rhubarb into about 1/2-inch chunks. Don’t worry about peeling it. There’s no need to after you give it a good washing. If your local grocery store (or garden) doesn’t carry fresh rhubarb, check out the frozen food section. Rhubarb can be found in most freezer sections.
- Toasting the pecans gives an extra, warm nutty flavor to the shortbread crust. So try not to overlook that step.
- Definitely make sure your cream cheese and eggs are at room temperature before making the cheesecake layer. This ensures a velvety smooth texture.
Hopefully after one bite of these squares, one’s rhubarb for rhubarb will be gone! Enjoy!
PrintStrawberry-Rhubarb Cheesecake Shortbread Squares
Akin to a Caroline Lockhart western novel, the cast of layered characters in these scrumptious summer-time squares don’t disappoint. A buttery, brown sugar shortbread crust. Rich, indulgent vanilla cheesecake. Tempting sweet strawberries. Cheeky, plucky rhubarb. Pecan-nutty topping. What could be better?!
- Prep Time: About 20 Minutes
- Cook Time: About 1 Hour
- Total Time: About 1-1/2 Hours + Refrigeration Time
- Yield: One 9X13-inch pan; approximately 12-16 squares 1x
Ingredients
For Crust & Topping:
2–1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1–1/2 cup pecans, chopped and toasted*
1 cup brown sugar (light or dark), firmly packed
1 cup unsalted butter, cold and cut into cubes
For Strawberry-Rhubarb Cheesecake Filling:
2–8 oz. bricks cream cheese, at room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
1 tsp. lemon juice
2 large eggs, at room temperature
4 cups rhubarb, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
2 cups strawberries (fresh or frozen**)
1 cup granulated sugar
4 tbsp. cornstarch
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 9 X 13-inch baking pan. Set aside.
To Prepare Crust and Topping:
In a medium size bowl, using a standing or handheld mixer, combine flour, pecans and brown sugar. Add chilled butter cubes and blend mixture on low to medium speed until coarse crumbs form. Pour and press half of the pecan mixture into the bottom of the prepared 9 X 13-inch pan. Set aside.
To Prepare Strawberry-Rhubarb Cheesecake Filling:
In a large bowl, beat cream cheese, granulated sugar and lemon juice until smooth and fluffy. Add large eggs and beat until smooth, scraping the bottom and the sides of the bowl frequently. Pour onto the pecan crust and smooth evenly to the pan edges.
In the same bowl, stir chopped rhubarb, strawberries, sugar, and cornstarch until evenly coated and combined. Spread evenly over the cheesecake layer. The strawberry-rhubarb mixture may combine with the softer cheesecake layer. This is ok.
Using remaining pecan mixture, sprinkle it evenly over the strawberry-rhubarb layer. Bake for 50 to 55 minutes, until the edges of the squares are bubbly and the center is slightly jiggly. Cool on a wire rack, then refrigerate for at least 2 to 3 hours before serving. Cut into squares to serve. Store covered in the refrigerator for up to a week.
Notes
*Roast chopped pecans in a preheated 400 degree oven for 7 to 9 minutes until fragrant. Stir often to avoid burning.
**If using frozen strawberries, thaw and drain strawberries before combining with sugar and cornstarch.
Frozen rhubarb may be available in your grocery store’s frozen food section. If using frozen rhubarb, thaw and drain before adding to the strawberries, sugar and cornstarch.
IMNPB
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