Filling, scrumptious and simply delicious, our apple and cinnamon crumble can be made as one large dish or cooked in seperate ramekins – whatever your preference, this is a firm traditional British staple pudding.
Andrew: I like the cinnamon twist to this.
Ingredients
Serves 4
Fruit base
4 cooking apples or 7-8 eating apples (any kind)
10g sugar
4 tbsp water
Crumble Topping
50g plain flour
25g porridge oats
20g softened low fat spread
10g sugar (granulated, castor, muscovado are all possibilities)
15g flaked almonds (toasted, optional)
¼ tsp of ground cinnamon
pinch of salt
Method
- Peel and cut into chunks the apples. Put in a saucepan.
- Add the 10g of sugar and water.
- Cook on the hob until the apples are partially softened, stirring so that the apples don’t stick to the saucepan base.
- Once softened, spoon the mushy-looking apples into a large cooking dish or four ramekins. Set aside to make the crumble topping.
Dawn: You can add additional soft fruits at this point, too.
Andrew: Like blackberries?
Dawn: Yes, Andrew or dribble 20-30g of sultanas or currants into the apples so they are generously strewn amongst the apples. I do like blackberries added at this point especially if they’re hedgerow ‘freebies’.
Andrew: It’s worth pointing out that if you use cooking apples, you may decide to add a little more sugar as they tend to be less sweet than eating apples.
Dawn: Excellent point, Andrew.
- To make the crumble topping, put the flour, spread, sugar and salt into a large bowl and using your fingertips, rub these ingredients together until they have combined to form what resembles fine breadcrumbs.
- Add the flaked almonds and gently combine.
Andrew: Be gentle at this point as you don’t want the almonds to become too fine.
Dawn: That’s right. I personally like the almonds to retain much of their size and shape as it adds to the finished texture and almost crunch-like quality of the topping when cooked.
- Next, add the oats and with equal care shown to the almonds, combine these with the existing crumble mixture.
- Add and combine the cinnamon.
Andrew: If you haven’t any cinnamon, use mixed spice. nutmeg or ginger. Whatever ground spices you may have in will all work really well here.
- You are now ready to sprinkle the crumble topping over the apple base. So, spooning the mixture, spread the topping equally over the apple fruit base.
- Place a pre-heated oven at gas mark 4/electric 180 degrees for about 35-40 minutes until the apple juices are bubbling and the crumble base has turned a nice golden light brown colour.
Andrew: Serve warm with either ice cream or fresh cream.
Dawn: Simply scrumptious! Or, custard and we’ll be bringing you homemade custard in our forthcoming recipes, too. Stay tuned to updates by following this food blog and over on Twitter @Love_Food_UK