Fruit Crisp on Demand

Many years ago, I made up a chart of consisting of the proportions of fruit and topping ingredients in each of the fruit crisp recipes I could find. It was a lot of fun to approach a recipe this way, and I’ve been sort of informally distilling that chart down to a grand unified fruit crisp recipe.

I adapted and adjusted flavors to accommodate the fruits of the season, and got pretty comfortable using a basic topping recipe that could be tweaked to make the most of the fruits I was using, or to use up what was in the pantry to make dessert. It wasn’t until recently, however, that I realized how simple it would be to make this kind of dessert no matter how much or little fruit I have on hand or how many or few servings I wanted to make.

What I do now, is mix up a big batch of crispy, crumbly topping – also known as streusel - and keep it in the freezer. The streusel I use is a simple mixture of rolled oats (quick oats would work), chopped nuts, brown sugar, flour, and some kind of liquid fat. I like oat flour or whole wheat flour, but just about anything would do. I like to use nut oils and match the chopped nuts (eg, almond oil with almonds), but melted butter is also delicious, and canola oil works well without any significant added flavor.

I just need to pool together whatever fruits are in the refrigerator (or use just one kind of fruit if that’s what I have), sweeten them to taste, add some flavorings such as lemon juice, almond extract, or cinnamon, and sprinkle in some cornstarch to thicken the juices that will be released when baking. I mound my mixture into some mini pie plates or ramekins, and put a good handful of streusel on top. Then, I bake them and that’s that.

Most recently, I used a mixture of firm but flavorful sliced peaches, super sweet and juicy golden plums, and some perky blueberries. I flavored it with a splash of each lemon juice and almond extract, and a bit of sugar. It didn’t matter how much fruit I used, because I had whatever small baking dishes I needed (2 mini pie plates and a ramekin) and a whole batch of crumble topping.

 

You can customize both the filling and the streusel topping to your liking ad infinitum! For stone fruits, I like to use a streusel with almonds and almond oil. For apple, pear, and cranberry season, I like to have some cinnamon and nutmeg in both the filling and topping, and use walnuts or pecans and walnut oil. Melted butter goes with anything.

Once the dishes of crisp are ready to bake, I like to put them on a sheet pan, regardless of their size, to catch any bubbling-over fruit juices before they burn on the oven floor. I bake at 350 F, and use other indicators than time to decide when to stop baking. The goal when making fruit crisps (or cobblers or pies) is to have the resulting mixture of released juices and cornstarch come to a good boil. This activates the thickening ability of the cornstarch and allows your dessert to be pleasantly jammy rather than juicy and runny. That bubbling goodness and tender fruit are what I look for in a finished fruit crisp. For small dishes this seems to take about 30-35 minutes. For a bigger pan of crisp, it will be more like 50 minutes to an hour.

 

I hope you’ll join me in this free-wheeling on-demand fruit crisp lifestyle. Even if you don’t have time to put together a freezer bag full of streusel, you could probably just sprinkle a few handfuls of your favorite granola on a sweetened fruit mixture and bake that up. Dessert will be spectacular. Minds will be blown.

Fruit Crisp Topping

This recipe can be halved or multiplied to suit your needs.

You can add spices to taste, either to the whole batch of streusel or to the streusel you are using to top your fruit just before baking.

2 cups rolled oats

1 cup flour – all purpose, whole wheat, or other whole grain

1 cup packed brown sugar

¼ teaspoon coarse salt

Up to 2 teaspoons warm spices, such as cinnamon, nutmeg Pumpkin Pie Spice, or other mixtures (optional)

½ cup chopped nuts

½ cup nut oil, melted butter, or neutral-tasting oil

1. Combine the oats, flour, brown sugar, spices (if using), salt, and nuts in a large bowl. Toss together to combine.

2. Pour in the oil or melted butter. Mix together until the dry ingredients are well coated with oil and the entire mixture appears moist.

3. Use to top fruit crisp immediately or store in an airtight container or zip top bag in the refrigerator for a few days or freeze in an airtight container or freezer bag for a few months. Remove enough topping to make crisps on demand and bake as directed below. No need to thaw before using.

To make fruit crisps on demand:

Sweeten:

For about 3 cups of sliced or chopped fruit, add about 2 tablespoons sugar for sweeter fruit, up to ¼ cup if the fruit is tart, and 1/3 to ½ cup if you are using particularly sour fruit, such as sour cherries, cranberries, or rhubarb.

Thicken:

For about 3 cups fruit, add about 1 tablespoon cornstarch.

Flavor:

Sprinkle in a teaspoon or two citrus juice, a bit of citrus zest, some minced fresh herbs, or a small amount of warm spice or extract to taste. Apples and pears are great with warm spices like cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom, cloves, and ginger. Almond extract enhances stone fruits. Fresh basil and thyme are great with berries.

Bake:

Portion your fruit mixture into a baking dish or dishes (small ramekins or mini pie plates make great individual servings.) Place as much or as little of your crisp topping as you want on top of the fruit. You could add spices to your topping at this point if desired. Bake at 350 F for 30 minutes to 1 hour, depending on the size of your dish or pan. Bake at least long enough to allow the juices to come to a boil and thicken and the topping to get golden brown.

Serve:

Allow to cool at least 20 minutes. Serve warm or at room temperature. Add a scoop of ice cream or whipped cream if you like (I do!). Keep leftovers in the refrigerator for a few days.

Other recipes like this one: Granola, Cherry Plum Crisp, Apple and Cranberry Crisp, Pear Apple Crisp with Cardamom, Pear Apple Crumble Pie

One year ago: Chocolate Zucchini Coffee Cake with Chocolate Crumb Topping

Apples and Cranberries

It’s mid-October and I’m still excited about apples. Just holding a fresh, locally-grown McIntosh or Cortland up to my nose and inhaling deeply can send me into a little Caddy Shack gopher dance. Then another regional specialty showed up in the stores: fresh cranberries, also grown not far away. I’ll get to fresh cranberry sauces another day. Around here, right about now, we love these beautiful little red gems in apple crisp. They give both fruity compliment and puckery tart contrast to the sweet, cinnamony baked apples.

Since cranberries are super-tart (downright sour, even), I gave the apple-cranberry filling in this crisp quite a bit of sugar. I also put in a relatively hefty dose of cornstarch (1 ½ tablespoon), because I’d been experiencing fruit crisps (like this one) that were a little weepy and runny for my taste. This time the filling was plenty thick. Some of the thickened juices even bubbled up to mingle with the sugary topping to create a few gooey, chewy caramel-like bites. Yummmmmm!

I really like the sort of rustic heartiness of the whole wheat flour in the crisp topping, but all-purpose flour would work as well. I highly recommend using walnut oil here, too. I just adds a little more nutty flavor, and, of course, compliments the walnuts in the topping as well. You could use canola oil or melted butter instead.

I’d like to say that I’ve been delaying my apple crisp gratification because I was waiting for the fresh local cranberries, but the truth is that I was waiting until there was space in the freezer for the vanilla ice cream. I’ve come to expect that cold, creamy contrast with the slightly tart baked fruit and crunchy sweet and nutty topping. Finally, there was a spot for the freezing canister for my ice cream maker and a little extra time available to make a custard base. I could have my Apple and Cranberry Crisp.

Ladies and gentlemen, don’t do this. Don’t force your baked-apple pleasure to wait on fickle ice cream. You may, like me, rush the process just enough to make it flop. My vanilla ice cream tasted great, but didn’t freeze properly. It was fine as a crisp topping, but was definitely not ready for its close-up. (That’s why it appears in none of the photos in this post. Let this be a lesson to us all.) Let the apple crisp be the star of its own show. It really does deserve to be, especially with those cranberry sidekicks.

Apple and Cranberry Crisp
I used Cortland apples, which become quite soft when baked. I also used fresh cranberries, but frozen cranberries will work just as well. No need to thaw.

For the filling:
5 cups peeled and chopped apple
1 cup fresh or frozen whole cranberries
1 ½ tablespoons cornstarch
1 cup sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
¼ teaspoon nutmeg

For the topping:
½ cup old fashioned rolled oats
½ cup whole wheat flour
½ cup brown sugar
½ teaspoon cinnamon
½ cup chopped walnuts
¼ cup walnut oil

1. Preheat oven to 375 F. Combine all of the filling ingredients in a large bowl. Stir together until the fruit is well-coated. Pour or spoon the filling into an 8”x 8” baking dish.

2. Combine the oats, flour, brown sugar, ½ teaspoon cinnamon and walnuts in a small bowl. Add the walnut oil and toss with a fork or work with your fingers until the entire mixture is moistened with the oil.

3. Top the filling in the baking dish with the topping.

4. Bake at 375 F 50 minutes or until the filling is thick and bubbly and the topping is browned. Check the crisp part way through baking and cover with aluminum foil if the top seems to be browning too much. You want a browned topping, but not a burned one.

Makes 6 servings. Serve with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream (or nothing, if you must.)

Summer Fruit Crisp

Each season has its fruits. In the late spring and early summer, there are strawberries and rhubarb. Autumn has apples, pears and cranberries. And right now the markets are full of stone fruits: peaches, nectarines, apricots, plums and cherries. All of these are excellent candidates for my favortie treatment for a season's fruits: fruit crisp.

Even more than pies and tarts, I like crisps. For one thing, they're easier to make. Just mix the fruit with sugar, a thickener such as flour or cornstarch, and perhaps an enhancing flavor like extract, citrus zest or warm spices like cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves. Then, you just toss together a topping of oats, flour, nuts and brown sugar, sprinkle it over the top and bake it. The most difficult part is waiting for the darn thing to cool enough to eat without blistering your tongue!

I've been trying to develop a basic recipe for fruit crisps that's just ready to go no matter what fruit is abundantly on hand. Most recently, it was piles of dark bing cherries and red plums. I couldn't help but keep buying cherries because their price was so good. And the plums were slightly soft when gently squeezed and smelled like, well, plums (something that's becoming rare in today's bullet-proof supermarket fruit).

For my streusel-like topping, I went with whole wheat pastry flour to bump up the flavor as well as the WFQ* (and because I bought a 5 pound bag of the stuff), melted butter for the fat (but you could use a neutral oil like canola, or a nut oil, which is really good), and almonds. I just think almonds and cherries are a match made in fruit-and-nut-topia, and good almond extract, which I added to the fruit mixture, is like a performance-enhancing drug for baked cherries.




I let the fruit speak for itself when I made this dessert. I didn't add too much sugar, and I didn't bake it into submission. There was still a bit of bite to the plums and cherries in the end, and what I think of as a pleasant, fruit-in-season tartness. If you think your fruit could do with a little more sugar, by all means add more, and if you like your fruit more like a puree or jam, just bake it longer.

Fruit crisps are a good way to start baking if you're inexperienced and not ready to tackle something more complicated, or are worried about your ability measure accurately. This stuff is pretty forgiving, rustic, even. If you are off in your measurements, it doesn't really matter. You could probably even use ready-made pie filling instead of fresh fruit if you have to, but you didn't hear that from me.

What you did hear from me, however, is that fruit crisps must, must, be served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. A dollop of whipped cream will do in a pinch. The only exception to this rule is if you eat leftover crisp for breakfast. It is mostly fruit and oatmeal after all. Nothing wrong with fruit and oatmeal for breakfast!




Cherry-Plum Crisp

filling
2 cups pitted dark sweet cherries
3 cups coarsely chopped pitted plums
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon almond extract


topping
1 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour (or all purpose flour)
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup chopped almonds
1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted

preheat oven to 350 F

1. Stir all of the filling ingredients together and pour into an 8" x 8" baking dish.

2. Combine the oats, flour, brown sugar and almonds and stir well. Pour the melted butter over the mixture and stir it all with a fork until the dry ingredients are well-moistened by the butter.

3. Cover the fruit filling mixture with the topping mixture, spreading it evenly over the top. Bake at 350 F for 35 to 45 minutes or until the top is golden brown and the filling is bubbly. If you desire to bake for the longer time, cover the dish with foil if the topping is over-browning.

4. Remove from the oven and cool on a wire rack 20 minutes or more. Serve warm with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or a dollop of whipped cream.

Serves 6

* WFQ: Whole Food Quotient