Apple & Blackberry Crumble

How many of us started off the New Year with all good intentions of not eating any cakes or having  any deserts only to  fall at the first hurdle.  Oh good not just me then.....

January was a month of coughs and colds and generally one or the other of us in the household not being very well and spending the majority of our time tucked up in bed.  Yet another birthday came  and went for me without me even noticing. Hey ho another year older not necessarily any the wiser as my old mum always used to say. We did eventually have a belated birthday treat when I was feeling a little more human.

Probably due to the fact that I had been so poorly and had felt so dreadful I was able to get through the month of January without actually partaking in any cake but come the 1st February I'm afraid I succumbed.

Well I did have to give my new Stand Up to Cancer apron a try...  Excuse the awful photograph but I had been poorly...

Growing up my family lived with my grandmother Nellie. The one abiding memory of my grandmother is that she always wore an apron or pinny as she called it and it always had pockets. We used to call it the pinny of many pockets because no matter what you wanted you could guarantee she would have it in the pocket of her pinny. Anything from a plaster for a grazed knee or a boiled sweetie to make to make you feel better.



I love the fact my apron has a large pocket on the front but I have no idea what I'm supposed to keep in there.  Any suggestions??

My grandmother was bought up in the North East of England, a miners daughter and her parents grew everything they could to feed their family of seven children. She loved her garden and had no end of fruit bushes and trees and certainly during the autumn and winter months there was an abundance of fruit crumbles or pies for desert.   A lot of things I make are the things that my mum and grandmother taught myself and my sisters and I loved making them for my own children when they were growing up and still love making them now even though there is just the three of us at home, it just means we get bigger portions and seconds.



Towards the end of the summer a friend of mine gave me a carrier bag full of apples and a big container full of blackberries from her garden. I cored, peeled and quartered the apples and divided the apples and blackberries into portions for the freezer.

I have always loved crumbles of any description but apple and blackberry crumble has always been one of my favorites from being a little girl and its one of my top ten winter warmers.


Crumble topping

225g/8oz plain flour or gluton free plain flour
175g/6 oz butter or non dairy spread
55g/2oz caster sugar
25g/1oz demerara  sugar
1/2 tsp ground ginger

• put the flour and ground ginger in a bowl and mix together 
• add the butter or non dairy spread and rub together until resembles bread crumbs. 
• add the caster sugar and stir together and leave to one side.

Filling

1 eating apple (cored, peeled & quartered)

2 Bramley apples (cored, peeled & quartered)

250g Blackberries

175g/6oz soft brown sugar

1 tbsp of lemon juice 

• Pre heat the oven to 190C/375F/Gas Mark 5
• Place the quartered apple pieces and blackberries in an oven proof dish 
• add the brown sugar and lemon juice and mix together
• spoon over the crumble topping 
• Sprinkle the topping with the demerara sugar 
• Bake in the oven for 30 - 40 minutes until the fruit is soft and the topping golden brown with juice from the fruit seeping through the top at the edges.

Serve warm with cream, custard, hot or cold, or a large scoop of vanilla ice cream. 

Now all that's left to do is sit back and enjoy

Mx