Crumble is usually a hit with everyone. With its combination of gooey fruit and crispy crust, it is guaranteed to please anyone. However, making this dessert requires a bit of technique, and following the right steps. You have to make sure that the fruit is well cooked, and that the crumble doesn't absorb too much moisture. Here are our tips for a delicious crumble.
Discover our latest podcast
Choosing the right fruit
To make a good crumble, you need good quality fruit. Since it is an essential part of this dessert, we advise you to choose quality fruit, ideally from organic or local farming. They will taste better and they will contain fewer pesticides. You should also opt for seasonal fruit since there's no need to add strawberries to a crumble in winter, right?
Some fruits are well suited for a crumble recipe. This is the case for apples, pears, berries, peaches, apricots, nectarines, figs, rhubarb, pineapple or mango... These are fruits that hold well when cooked.
To prevent the fruit from letting water out when cooked, you can pre-cook them by browning them with butter and sugar in a frying pan so that they are golden brown. You can then remove the excess water before putting them in the baking pan.
The crumble dough
The crumble dough should be shortcrust pastry, with a generous amount of butter, and without too much flour so that it isn't too crumbly. To do this, the equal parts rule must be applied, i.e., as much flour as butter and sugar. For example, for a crumble dough recipe, you should use:
- 100 g of flour
- 100 g sugar
- 100 g butter
- 100 g almond powder
Variations on the dough
To give a touch of originality to your crumble without altering it too much, you can change a few ingredients in the dough.
- For example, you can replace half of the regular wheat flour with buckwheat, rye, chestnut or spelt flour.
- Feel free to vary the sugars by using date, coconut, or unrefined sugar.
- To replace the almond powder, use hazelnut powder, which has a stronger taste.
The flavour of the crumble
To make your crumble exceptional, there are a few tricks that will make all the difference. Here are some of them:
- Marinate the fruit in lemon juice, other citrus fruit juice or spices before cooking.
- Add spices: vanilla, saffron, cinnamon, pepper, nutmeg...
- Combine chocolate with certain fruits (it goes well with pear).
- Mix several types of fruit: apple / pineapple, rhubarb / raspberry, pears / figs...
- Add crunchiness: nuts, almonds, muesli, dried fruit, grated coconut...
Cooking
Once your crumble is ready, you'll need to bake your crumble until it is a nice, golden dessert, with decadent fruit and a crunchy crust. To do this, you will have to put it in the oven at a low temperature, ideally 170 C° for about 30 minutes.
Ear your crumble with whipped cream, vanilla ice cream or even custard. A real treat!
