Sunday, January 4, 2015

Great apple crumble/crisp

New year's resolutions... Well, over the years, I realise how futile they are. The no.1 resolution that always goes down the wrong pathway: "Lose weight".. Sorry, not sorry but I'm eating apple crumble.. But in all seriousness I hope that I can eat slightly more healthier and refrain from eating so much desserts this year. And be a bit more active. But I guess it'll come and go. My number 1 resolution is to STAY ORGANISED because I have a big school year ahead! My last ever year of high school. Nervous, but can't wait to get out.

Anyway, it's funny how we have different names for food. For example, we say 'tomato sauce' in Australia, in the states, it's 'ketchup'. We usually say 'muesli', not 'granola'. Having lived in Australia for more than half my life, I have come to discover 'apple crumble'. Oh the humble apple crumble... Or known as 'apple crisp'?
To be quite frank, I prefer apple crumble to apple pie. I love all the oats and crumbly buttery bits on top of steaming hot apples and pouring custard or eating it with vanilla ice cream.

Ambitious kitchen is one of my go-to blogs, her recipes are easy and delicious! So how could I go past a post titled 'The best apple crisp you'll ever have with brown butter'?
It certainly was a great recipe, and I ended up going back for many, many, many more slices. With copious amounts of vanilla ice cream.

I have to excuse myself for the horrid pictures though.. I wasn't quite sure how to photograph apple crumble lol!!!
Apple crisp 
Ingredients
For the topping
-1 cup all purpose flour (I used combination of 1/2 cup whole wheat, 1/2 cup all purpose)
-1 cup old fashioned oats
-1 cup dark brown sugar *
-1/2 cup chopped almonds
-1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, softened and cut into pieces
*I used light brown sugar and reduced it to 1/2 cup.

For the filling:
-1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter
-1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise (or vanilla extract)
-6 medium sized Granny smith apples, peeled, cored and very thinly sliced
-1/3 cup dark brown sugar
-1 tsp cinnamon
-1 tsp bourbon (or 1/2 tsp vanilla extract)

Method
1.Preheat oven to 350 F (180 C). Grease an 8 x 8 inch baking pan.
2.To make topping: Combine flour, oats, brown sugar & almonds in a large bowl until well-combined. Add in the pieces of butter and use your hands to squeeze and combine until mixture becomes crumbly and resembles wet sands (or cut butter pastry cutter or place all topping ingredients in a food processor and pulse until just blended).
3.Once finished, place topping in the fridge and begin making apple filling.
4.To make the filling: place butter and seeds from vanilla bean in a medium saucepan and turn heat on medium. After a couple of minutes the butter will begin to crackle & foam. Whisk consistently until a brown colour. Remove from heat as soon as the butter begins to give off a nutty aroma. Set aside to cool for a few minutes.
5.While butter is cooling, place apples, 1/3 cup brown sugar, cinnamon and bourbon in a large bowl and toss to combine. Add brown butter to apple mixture and toss again to combine.
6.Take 1/2 cup of topping mixture and toss with apple mixture. Place apple mixture in prepared pan and sprinkle evenly with topping.
7.Bake the crumble on a baking sheet for 55-60 minutes or until topping is golden brown and filling is bubbling. Remove from oven and cool 10 minutes on wire rack. Serve warm with vanilla bean ice cream.

*Adapted from Ambitious kitchen

2 comments:

  1. How many servings does this recipe make?

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    Replies
    1. Hi Kristina, it depends on the size of tray you're using, but I used a tray slightly bigger than the normal 8 x 8, and I could easily get about 8 servings? Depends on your proportion sizes. It does make quite a lot of crumble & apples. Hope that helps :)

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