Sunday roasts in the winter need a good rib sticking dessert. I grew up on crumbles filled with whatever fruit was on hand or being grown in the garden. This is a slight twist on a normal crumble. The deep dish pie crust is filled with a mixture of apples and pears, that are in abundance at the moment. Topped with a buttery and nutty crumble mixture, I use pecans a lot in my baking as I love the sweet nutty taste but walnuts would work just as well. The demerara sugar also gives the crumble the extra crunchy texture.
Author: CluckMuckCook
Serves: 8 slices
Ingredients
Ingredients:
Pastry
225g plain flour
150g butter, chilled
25g icing sugar
1 large free-range egg
2 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon of cinnamon powder.
Crumble Topping
110g plain flour
160g demerara sugar (or soft brown sugar)
90g butter
90g pecans, roughly chopped
1½ teaspoons of ground cinnamon
Pinch of salt
Fruit Filling
4 large Cox’s apples, peeled, cored, and chopped into thick slices
4 Conference pears, peeled, cored, and chopped into thick slices
½ lemon (Juice only)
100g raisins
100g caster sugar
2 tablespoons cornflour.
Instructions
Pastry
Sift the flour into a bowl and rub in the butter using your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Or blitz in a food processor. Then mix in the icing sugar and cinnamon.
Add the egg and 2 tablespoons of cold milk and mix until it forms a dough. Try not to overwork the dough.
Wrap the ball of dough in cling film and chill For 30 minutes
Roll the chilled dough into about a 14-inch disk, then line a 9 to 10 inch wide, (2 to 3 inch deep) pie dish.
Pop back in the fridge and chill for another 30 minutes while you prepare the fruit and crumb topping.
Topping
Add the flour, sugar, cinnamon, and salt to a large bowl and rub in the butter using your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.
Then mix in the roughly chopped pecans and pop the bowl in the fridge whilst you prepare the filling.
Filling
Peel, core and chop up the apples and pears into thick slices. Place into a bowl and add the lemon juice to stop them going brown.
Mix together the sugar and cornflour and add to the apples and pears .
Add in the raisins and mix until everything is distributed evenly and the apples and pears are coated with sugar and cornflour.
Preheat the oven to 190c/170c Fan/ Gas Mark 5.
Add the filling to the pastry case, then top with the crumble. Heap it up in the middle to get it all on, as the fruit will settle a little when cooked.
Place into the preheated oven and bake for 1 to 1 ¼ hours or until the crumble topping is golden and the fruit juices are bubbling around the edge.
Allow to cool to room temperature to get the perfect slice.
Recipe by Cluck, Muck & Cook at http://cluckmuckcook.co.uk/apple-and-pear-crumble-pie/