Almond and Apple-Berry Crumble

You arrive home from work, the dog whines to be fed, soon the rest of the family will too. Autumn is in the air, you can feel it tousle your shirt with the wind, and you wander through the dappled dregs of summer light in search for fruit. With a bowl pressed to your hip, you pick some apples, green and stretched with pink lines. The dog follows in tandem, and you throw dud ones for him to fetch. Dodging the thorns, your fingertips pull at blackberries overgrowing down the lane to a church. Back at the house and you peel, cut, wash, sift, weigh and finally rub in the butter. It smells like cake. The kitchen is warming up as you sneak a peek, opening the oven door just ajar- not done yet, you like it crispy. But the scent of the bake has drawn in your small crowd, and they gather round the kitchen table. Even the dog poises its wet nose up, slobbering. The chattering increases with the impatience of growling bellies. Armed with oven gloves, as soon as you pull out from the oven this golden delight, bubbling purple and sticky around the edges, just for one moment you have everybody transfixed and silent. You place it on the table in glorious triumph- ‘Ta-dah!’- before it is sweetly demolished. Home is where the crumble is.

This was originally going to be a blackberry and apple crumble, but whilst the apples were plentiful and ripe, the blackberries were on their last legs. However, I managed to collect around 150g of raspberries and blackberries combined, which turned out to be a delectable twist that really works well with the almond. I encourage you to use what is seasonal and available, although you can always nip to the supermarket! This recipe has a high crumble to fruit ratio, because everybody knows the crumble is the best bit, but you could easily double the amount of fruit if that’s how you like it.

Ingredients:

• 100g plain flour

• 30g ground almonds

• 20g rolled oats

• 100g butter, cold and grated

• 50g brown sugar

• 50g caster sugar (plus 2 tsp extra)

• A sprinkle of flaked almonds

• 400g prepared fruit

• Vanilla ice-cream (to serve)

Recipe:

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C

2. Add the flour, ground almonds and rolled oats into a large bowl and very lightly rub in the butter.

3. Stir in the sugar.

4. Prepare the fruit. Cube the apples and wash the berries.

5. Butter the oven-proof dish and add the fruit, sprinkle with a tad more sugar.

6. Finally, add the crumble mix and sprinkle with a few flaked almonds.

7. Bake for 25- 30 mins until it is bubbling around the edges and golden all over.

8. Serve with ice-cream or custard.

What happens if you steal a crumble? You end up in custardy.

Dig in! x