A: Crumble in the jungle

On my quest to discover the perfect crumble, I decided last night to make a little dent in what remains from my wholesale market apple glut to create my version of the classic apple crumble. My 2 weeks of chutney-ing has also left me with a bunch of ingredients in my home that I might not normally have in my pantry (magic as it may be). One of these ingredients is dried cherry, which I used in my Apple, Tomato and Cherry chutney a few weeks back (just one of the many backlogged events I plan to post!). I had originally planned to include some candied ginger as well, which I used in my Tomato and Date chutney, but remembered swiftly that the last time I’d used candied ginger, it’d been met with a less than enthusiastic response from man. Also left over in my fridge is a generous shot of Sloshed Apple Liqueur from R’s alcoholic pantry (which I only remembered after I had raided my own stash and was walking into the kitchen with a bottle of port in hand).

So, armed with fruit and alcohol the alchemy began…

Boozy Apple and Cherry Crumble

Ingredients:

Filling:

1/4 cup Apple liqueur (while I was fortunate to have procured this from a compulsive liqueur collector, I imagine port, cherry/apple brandy, schnapps, cointreau or even a vanilla vodka would do great here!)

3 Pink Lady apples, peeled, cored and chopped

2 heaped tbsp dried cherries (I am completely sold on these little gems and are relying on them to tide me through while I hang out for cherry season to begin properly)

4 tsp brown sugar

1 tsp ground cinnamon

Topping:

4 heaped tbsp plain flour

2 heaped tbsp ground almonds

2 heaped tbsp ground hazelnuts

1 heaped tbsp softened butter

1 heaped tbsp brown sugar

Method:

Soak cherries in liqueur for as long as possible (I managed 1 hour).

Combine filling ingredients (yes, including the liqueur) and divide between 2 250ml ramekins.

Combine topping ingredients until resembles fine breadcrumbs.

Press topping onto crumble and bake at 200C for 30 minutes.

We enjoyed this with some organic greek yogurt, which man declared might even be better than cream! It was lovely and thick, beautifully creamy and made us feel almost like we were eating healthily. I suppose if you don’t take the butter and sugar into consideration, this really is a pretty decent in terms of fat and sugar consumption. (Or not, I really don’t care!)

I’d topped man’s crumble with 3/4 of the topping mix, leaving a scant 1/4 left for myself, which left fruit-loving me happy and crumble-loving man very satisfied indeed. The cherries plumped up all fat and full of boozy, apple-y goodness and in my view and 10 times better than raisins (which I generally don’t enjoy in my desserts).

A: A rumble for a crumble!

Reading R’s post on her luscious strawberry crumble was so inspiring that I couldn’t possibly ignore the overwhelming urge to crumble any longer! Armed with a beautiful bottle of limoncello and some pineapple sage from the garden, I proceeded to satisfy an insane need for warm fruit on a cool spring evening.

Divide 250g of washed and hulled strawberries between 2 ramekins. (What can I say, I like my fruit!)

Add 1 tbsp limoncello, 1/2 tsp sugar and 2-3 torn leaves of pineapple sage/mint/basil to each ramekin.

Combine 30g flour, 20g butter, 1 tbsp ground almonds, 1 tbsp sugar and mix until it resembles breadcrumbs. Top ramekins with mixture. (Unlike R, I really don’t like wholemeal, the virtues of which are superseded by the fact that it tastes like cardboard to me!!!)

Bake at 200C for 30 minutes.

Enjoy as is. OR…

With lashings of cream and a fancy garnish!

Verdict? Too little crumble for man, who is a confirmed Atkins dropout. The good thing about fruit crumble is that it’s versatile enough to accommodate all manner of tastes. Now that my carbohydrate-loving manrat has declared his need for a near 50-50 fruit-crumble ratio, I know for next time to adjust accordingly, where I could easily eat stewed fruit as is!

As I write this I am reminded of the lovely ruby-red rhubarb that sits in my fridge awaitng further instruction. Watch this space for the next installment of the crumble diaries!