Deconstructed blackberry and apple crumble

I’m a huge fan of crumble, but have recently discovered a way of making it so quickly, and in small quantities, so I can have an instant crumble for one late at night when I fancy a sneaky sugar kick!  I’ve called it ‘deconstructed’ crumble, which makes it sound very chef-y and pretentious, but really it’s just some delicious oaty, almondy crumbs that can be sprinkled on any fruit you’ve got to hand, which is very quickly stewed (well, warmed through) while the crumble bakes.  Our garden is groaning with blackberries at the moment, so I’ve been eating this quite often with them, but you could use other berries, apples, pears, peaches or whatever combination you fancy.

Raspberry, elderflower and amaretti crumble (wheat-free)

My sister Lizzie came over for dinner this evening after work and I made this as a quick wheat-free pudding. I was pleased that it was also a dairy-free and sugar-free dessert as we’re all trying to be healthy, but then quickly realised that there was plenty of sugar in the amaretti biscuits and elderflower cordial (and in fact the porridge oats were golden syrup-flavoured).  On that realisation, I decided to hang it all and served it with gorgeous salted caramel ice cream – there’s always tomorrow to try being healthy…

Rhubarb, orange and cinnamon crumble pie

My mum came to stay at the weekend and arrived with a great basket of wonderful fruit and veg from her allotment. The most amazing globe artichokes, the biggest yellow courgettes I've ever seen, and great long stalks of rhubarb. This evening I turned the rhubarb into a pie with a nutty crumble topping, and flavoured the fruit with the zest and juice of an orange and spiced with cinnamon. Served, of course, with lashings of custard!

Gooseberry, apple and lavender crumble

It's gooseberry season, one of my favourite fruits which only seem to appear in grocers for but a few weeks a year. As soon as I laid eyes on some, I couldn't resist filling a bag full of them and bringing them home to make into a lovely stewed crumble filling. Usually I would add a splash of elderflower cordial to this, but I don't have any in the house today so instead decided to add a little lavender to the crumble topping, to give it a different flavour but still one reminiscent of flowering hedgerows on warm sunny walks in the countryside.

Spiced berry maple betty

Tonight I cooked dinner for our friends Cath and Gregg – a lovely recipe for thyme-roasted belly of pork from Diana Henry’s amazing book, Food from Plenty.  I served it with yellow, orange and purple heritage carrots, purple sprouting broccoli, balsamic roasted red onions, and celeriac, mustard and parsley mash. Not bad, even if I say so myself!  Anyway, in browsing through Diana Henry’s book, my attention was grabbed by her recipe for blackberry, apple and maple brown betty.  She describes it as “a great, down-home American dessert that’s even easier to make than crumble.”  Anything described as “down-home” sounds good to me!

This is my adaptation of that recipe, but I used mixed frozen berries instead of apple and fresh blackberries.  Apart from that, and the addition of a little cinnamon, I’d followed her recipe exactly when I made this, which included so much sugar (mixed with the cake crumbs, and also mixed with the fruit before maple syrup is poured over them) that it was unbelievably sweet.  So here I’ve written the recipe without any extra sugar, as I’m sure it’s completely unnecessary.  Apart from that, it’s amazing – it feels a bit wrong to use cake instead of a crumble mixture, but wow it’s delicious – it’s so moist and soaks up lots of the fruit, so it’s a bit like a hot SummerPudding (which is my all-time favourite dessert)!

Cranberry apple crumble

I went to stay with my mum for a few days this week, and we had a lovely time making Christmas cards on her new printing press. When I arrived I popped into her local grocer to buy some flowers, and couldn't resist a punnet of shiny, glowing red cranberries. I turned them into a crumble with apples, cinnamon and an oat and almond topping. This turned out to be wonderful for breakfast!

Blackberry, apple and almond crumble muffins

Some quick muffins - these don't need an electric mixer, they are so quick to mix by hand. A nice way to use some lovely blackberries that are in season at the moment, and a left-over bramley apple from the spiced apple, rum and pecan pie I made the other day!

Rhubarb and raspberry almond crumble (wheat-free)

Last night we had a birthday dinner for my mum at her house, using lots of fruit and veg from her allotment. I made a quick rhubarb and raspberry crumble, with a wheat-free topping made from ground almonds and rice flour, as my sister is coeliac. It was delicious! The quantities here are rough estimates really, as I tend to make crumbles by eye.

Raspberry crumble cake bars

As usual, I came home tired from work but with a sweet tooth and wanted something really quick and easy to rustle up for pudding.  We had a couple of small punnets of raspberries in the fridge and two eggs, and this was the result.  I even used American style measuring cups as I'm getting to see how amazingly simple they are - just scoop up the right amount of flour or sugar without thinking about scales!  Unfortunately, my tiredness meant I used only 4oz butter (what the Americans call 1 'stick') when the recipe I was using actually called for '1 cup', which is 8oz.  It seemed to turn out perfectly though, so I think I can therefore call this a healthy dessert as it has 50% less butter!

Banana, yoghurt, honey, oats and walnut muffins

It's my Saturday morning baking session and so I've used up a couple of ripe bananas to make some breakfast muffins.  These fill the house with an amazing smell while they're cooking, and taste delicious!

Apple and elderflower crumble pies

Our fridge was empty this morning, which always makes both me and Lu feel sad!  Languishing on an otherwise empty shelf was a packet of ready-made pastry.  This was a way to make it, and a slightly tired looking bag of granny smith apples, go a long way, and cheer us all up on a wintry day when everyone in our house is feeling under the weather!  The pastry was enough to make 12 large muffin sized pies and 12 mini ones.  A bit of spice, some elderflower cordial and the juice and zest of a clementine helped make them a bit more festive, what with Christmas only days away now.  A mouthful of a mini apple pie like this can't fail to make you smile!

Pear and raspberry crumble pots

These are a really quick and simple pud and take just a few mins to prepare, then can be baked in the oven while you eat dinner.  Delicious! 

Apple, cranberry and cinnamon crumble muffins

Some wrinkled-looking apples languishing in my fruit bowl were the excuse to invent these.  I’ve used the same yoghurt muffin mix from my redcurrant and white chocolate muffins and added a crumbly topping like that used for my apple and blackberry crumble.  The smell of cinnamon fills the house as these are baking – yummy!

Apple and blackberry crumble

A classic recipe with a flap-jacky twist - this is the best crumble topping I've experimented with and so had to be preserved!