Due to the new addition to our family, Lisl’s mother flew over from Sydney. Over time, I’ve come to grips with the Australian craving for fruit. My niece consumes it in vast quantities. You actually have to strenuously encourage her to eat something *other* than fruit. She could be a bat, save for the whole sleeping upside-down thing. Needless to say, the first thing I did was pop into Costco for a bunch of mangos and blackberries. A fruit crumble was destiny, helped by the fact that they are so simple to do (i.e. sleep-deprived parents can easily whip one up).
There is a debate over the proper name for this dessert. The Aussies call this a crumble, and Americans call this a crisp. I don’t really view either one as right or wrong, any more than I would weigh down on the side of coriander vs cilantro, or eggplant vs aubergine. Open minded, that’s me. Unless you’re talking about raw sea urchin. Or yams. No yams. Ever. We digress.
Four Fruit Crumble (or Crisp)
1/4 cup flour
3/4 cup oats (the regular kind, not instant)
1 cup brown sugar
8 tbsp unsalted butter, chopped
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 small pinches of salt*
1 mango, peeled, pitted and cubed
4 oz blueberries (small container)
8 oz of blackberries
8 oz strawberries (topped and chopped)
Preheat the oven to 350F.
Wash and chop your fruit and place it in a pie dish or small baking dish. It probably goes without saying, but do not feel beholden to stick to my ratio of one fruit versus another.
In a large bowl, combine the flour, oats, brown sugar, butter, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt. Mix it all together with your hands, and break the pieces of butter up with your thumbs and forefingers until they are small-pea-sized.
Spread the oats mixture over the top of the fruit.
Bake for an hour, then let cool for 10 minutes. Serve with some vanilla ice cream. I know the below photo isn’t going to win any awards, but really, with a dish like this, it’s eatin’ time!
* a pinch is the amount you can pick up between your thumb and forefinger.
Giff, pour vous:
Betty — a baked pudding made of layers of spiced and sugared fruit and buttered bread crumbs.
Clafoutis — a French cobbler, with fruit (usually cherries) on the bottom, custard, and a rough batter crust baked on top
Cobbler — a spoon pie (more like a fruit stew with dumplings), in which biscuit dough is dropped onto the fruit before baking. The consensus is that the dish got its name because the lumps of cooked dough resembled cobblestones.
Crisp — a deep-dish fruit dessert made with a crumb or streusel topping and baked.
Crumble — a British dessert in which raw fruit is topped with a crumbly pastry mixture and baked. One reference says a crumble is like a crisp, but not as rich.
Grunt — a spoon pie, with biscuit dough on top of stewed fruit, which is steamed, not baked
Pandowdy — a spoon pie, with fruit on the bottom and a rolled crust on top, which is broken up to allow the juices to come through
Slump — a spoon pie, including cooked or uncooked fruit topped with biscuit dough or piecrust, which can be baked or steamed, and can be made upside down
You happy now? I learned a lot reading that!
oh i can hardly wait for summer – all the fresh fruit and berries – then dearest Giff I will make this! looks lovely!
I am *drooling*. I’m going to have my mom make this for me when she comes to visit to help me with MY newborn this week!!
Near info from Stacey.
Wait, coriander is same a cilantro?!? Please confirm!
I’m with u on the anti-yam stance. Sweet potato all the way.
All things fruity are yummy whatever you call them!
Love me some crisp! I’ve got some rhubarb in the fridge that needs to be made into one now
Good on the Aussies for eating lots of fruit. Sneaking in some fruit in this lush crisp is hardly covert but I wouldn’t refuse a bowl. Oh, and…2 scoops of French vanilla!
As for me, a pinch is the amount I pour in the cusp of my hand until it forms an adequately sized mini-dune.
A far more precise method than this random pinching affair – what if you have small fingers? What if the salt is coarse?
All hail to the mini-dune method!