Rhubarb Coconut Coffee Cake

About two weeks ago I noticed a cluster of tiny green and ruby red rhubarb sprouts bursting through the soil just slightly.  Yesterday I went back out into the yard to assess the situation and saw those wee buggers were knee high!  After very busy summer last year I vowed to not let our rhubarb go to waste this  time around, and  we have two formidable bushes to tend.  I took this as a welcome sign summer isn't far off,  and promptly  became desperate to bake something with our lovely first harvest. I decided to mix one of my favorite fruits into one of my ultimate favorite desserts; coffee cake.

Rhubarb Coconut Coffee Cake

-  2 1/2 half cups all-purpose flour

- 1 cup milk

-1 T lemon juice

-1 t. vanilla

-11/2 cups brown sugar

-2/3 cup canola oil

-1 egg

-1 t. salt

-1 1/2 cups chopped rhubarb

-1/2 cup coconut

-1/4 cup brown sugar

-1 t. ginger

1 1/2 t. Cinnamon

1 T. Butter

Directions:
Preheat oven to 325 degrees and grease two 9 by 5 loaf pans. In a bowl stir together milk lemon juice and vanilla and let stand for 10 minutes. In a large bowl mix together1 1/2 cups brown sugar oil and egg. Combine flour salt and baking soda sugar mixture alternating with the milk mixture until just combined fold in the rhubarb and coconut pour batter into prepared loaf pounds in small bowl combine one fourth cup brown sugar cinnamon and butter. Sprinkle this mixture over the unbaked loafs. Bake in preheated oven for 15 minutes until a toothpick inserted into the center of a loaf comes out clean.

I am in love with this crumbly delicious-ness.

 It helps that this rhubarb is as sweet as candy, and the coconut gives it a nice moisture.  This makes for a great breakfast, or tea-time if you're into that sort of thing.  Also I'd imagine would be great with some vanilla bean ice cream......  I'm going to need a lot of recipe renditions for rhubarb (Woah, try saying that five times fast!) if I'm going to get the most out of my bounty this summer. Enjoy!