A fumble with a crumble
Don’t worry, we’re not doing a crumble recipe fully…because seriously, who can’t make a crumble?
What we are doing is sharing a few tips to get a great crumble, an interesting crumble, the sitting on the washing machine of crumbles…
Most crumbles are good if not great. The squishy filling the buttery, sweet top, that middle section where the layers embrace each other and create the warm stodgy gloop of wonder. So, how can we improve? Texture, texture people! Texture, texture, texture!!!
What we want out of a crumble is all of the above, plus, an interesting nugget of something here, a crunch of joy there…something to literally get our teeth into! Because, let’s face it, crumbles may be a comforting delight but you could gum your way through most of them (and there’ll be plenty of time for than in our twilight years sat by the window in the nursing home).
So here’s how we make our crumble a bit more stimulating…
Crumble Top Wondercat Style
- 100g butter
- 100g golden caster sugar
- 200g plain flour
- 100g rolled oats
- 50g hazelnuts
- pinch o’ salt
- 1 tsp baking powder
- seeds from a vanilla pod
- splash of cream or milk
- bit of brown sugar
- rub butter into flour until breadcrumby
- stir in salt, sugar, bp, vanilla seeds
- cut through a splash of cream just to get it sticking to inself
- grab dough, give it a squeeze (like honking on a boob possibly?) then plonk onto a baking tray
- it should be crumby in places, doughy in places, thick in bits, sandy in others
- bake at 170ºC until some bits are golden and crisp but others are still uncooked and stodgy
- leave to cool (ok, eat a little bit…it’s fucking scrummy)
- crunch up about 2/3rds (oh a fraction, I feel so 1970’s cookbook) of the hazelnuts roughly with a rolling pin
- take a zip-lock bag and put in the crushed nuts, the oats and snap up the biscuit stuff and throw that in too.
- take out anger with rolling pin on bag of stuff…don’t go too crazy as you want, no, REQUIRE boulders and nuggets of biscuit greatness
- pour onto your crumble filling, if it is very stir in a bit of melted butter to get it a little sticky
- scatter or arrange the intact hazelnuts on top
- sprinkle on a bit of brown sugar
- bake as your recipe says
So, Autumn is here, there is fruit a plenty and nipple-bitingly cold weather approaching! Go and make crumble!
Posted on October 22, 2011, in Desserts, Disasters, Experimental and tagged autumn, best, crumble, greatest, hazelnut, recipe. Bookmark the permalink. 2 Comments.
Oh Crumbs haha
Your poor iPhone! It might have leapt to its death, which is probably what my phone would have done if I stuffed it down my undies and danced around!
Love the hazelnut ring around your crumble — they make it look super fancy(under)pants. 😉