Apple Crumble Recipe

Everybody's good at cooking something, and I'm good at cooking crumble.

Lorraine Bowen's 'The Crumble Song' has remained stuck in my head ever since the fateful day I first heard it in 2015, but with the following recipe I often find myself agreeing with the above statement. My baking is usually disastrous, let's just say Mary Berry would be disappointed in me (something which breaks my heart), but somehow my crumbles always turn out nicely.

The trick is keep it simple - don't throw things in there that aren't needed. It was with great horror that I sat down at a family meal once and found pine nuts in my crumble (who puts pine nuts in anything, let alone a perfectly good pudding?) and so I proceeded to spend the next ten minutes fishing them out. I beg of you, please don't ever put pine nuts in a crumble.

I've picked up a number of tips over the last few years, and it's these that I would like to share with you first:

The butter is perhaps the most important ingredient. You also want the crumble to be crunchy and crumbly (hence the name!) and one of the best ways to achieve this that I've found is using a mix of butter in the recipe. You want to use both unsalted butter and spreadable butter (e.g. Lurpak) - something I discovered entirely by accident but haven't gone back from since because it just works!

The apple is the next most important aspect of the pudding (obviously). Whilst you're chopping it up, keep it in a bowl of water and lemon juice to stop it from browning. Then, once you've finished and put it in the dish, add a little bit of the water/lemon juice mix in there as well. This helps to soften the apple when cooking the crumble; nothing's worse than having a perfect topping and crunchy apple beneath! Also, try adding a sprinkle of soft brown sugar and cinnamon on top of the apple before you add the crumble - it makes this delicious caramelised layer between the apple and crumble which in my opinion is the best bit! It will also fill your kitchen with the most amazing smell - a definite upside.

My final tip is, even though it's so tempting to eat it there and then, leave it on the side for 10 minutes or so once cooked. This allows the crumble topping to really crisp up and makes the finished pudding a thousand times better.

Enjoy!

Serves 4-6 people - depends how hungry you are...

Ingredients

• 3 or 4 Bramley Apples (peeled, cored and roughly sliced or chopped)
• 7.5oz Soft Brown Sugar (and a little extra)
• 7.5oz Plain Flour
• 3oz Unsalted Butter
• 2.25oz Spreadable Butter (e.g. Lurpak)
• 3oz Rolled Oats (the chunkier the better!)
• 1tbsp Ground Cinnamon
• Pinch of Salt

Method

1. Pre-heat the oven to 190°C.
2. Put the apples in an oven-proof dish along with a little water.
3. Sprinkle the cinnamon and extra brown sugar on-top.
4. In a large bowl, rub together the flour, butter and salt to form breadcrumb-type pieces of mixture.
5. Mix in the soft brown sugar and the oats.
6. Spread evenly over the apple.
7. Cook for 30-40 minutes.
8. Leave to cool for as long as you can wait - ten minutes or so.
9. Serve either on its own, or with custard/cream/ice cream/whatever takes your fancy ... just, not pine nuts please.