Sweet Freedom: Apple Crumble

"Surely the apple is the noblest of fruits." — Henry David Thoreau, Wild Apples

Not much of a back story for this post...I had a friend coming home during reading week and I asked her what baked good she most desired. She picked apple crumble, so that's what I made!

Apple Crumble
(adapted from Green Kitchen Stories Crabapple Crumble Pie Recipe and The Food Lover's Primal Apple Crisp)

For Filling

Ingredients:

7 medium size apples (Granny Smith)
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1 Tbsp. cornstarch
juice of 1 lemon

Instructions:

1. Peel and cut up your apples.
2. In a bowl, combine lemon juice, cornstarch and spices. Toss apples in the spiced liquid until covered. Set Aside.

For Crumble:

Ingredients:

250 grams finely chopped almonds
180 grams oats
2 Tbsp cinnamon
2 tsp ginger
5 grams sea salt
70 grams coconut oil
150 grams maple syrup
Vanilla
Zest of one lemon

Instructions:

1. Combine dry ingredients and wet ingredients separately, then mix together.
2. Line a casserole dish with parchment paper, fill with apples and top with crumble.
3. Bake at 350F covered with tin foil for 50-60 minutes, or until apples are tender. Uncover for the last 10 minutes, allowing the crumble to golden.

I divided this recipe into two batches. I didn't want to bake the whole thing only to realize it was, for example, too sweet or not sweet enough. However, the initial, tester batch was a smaller portion, fitting into a glass loaf pan, so smaller than the one pictured. I assume it could all fit into a slightly larger glass dish.

The recipe was a success. My mom, myself and my friend, Michelle, loved it...but that's not much of a surprise, when all you're doing is baking apples and topping them with a bunch of delicious things. The crumble is not too sweet and it has a good crumble to fruit ratio. I adore the lemon flavour, both in the crumble and coating the apples...I think I have become obsessed with adding lemon zest to my baking since I made those Thumbprint Cookies. You assume you could add anything you want to the crumble part—nuts, raisins, or any other dried fruit—but I wanted to keep it simple. It's pretty crumbly crumble right out of the oven, but if you let it cool, it does firm up. I always prefer my fruit crumbles once they've had time to cool, and some of the fruit juice has soaked into the crumble to make it softer...this explains why I started eating it straight out of the dish while taking pictures the next day.