Apple and Plum Crumble/The way the Crumble crumbles-Mmm...

I owe you guys this recipe. Some of you try the desserts I've raved over and send me a nice little thank-you note to wake up to (thank you). Some of you give me kick-ass awards. It makes the seemingly-easy-but-actually-tough job that running the blog is, worth doing.

My way of thanking you back is to virtually cater to your requests. Some of you have been asking me for vegetarian recipes, especially pastry. So I'm giving you one of my trustworthy, prized recipes.. a delicious Apple and Plum Crumble.

It has no eggs in it. Pre-requisite for any pastry in India, whose vegetarians are invariably non-eggetarians.

It has just over couple of tablespoons of butter. Nothing that'll you have to pant on the EFX machine for hours together to burn. Just enough for giving off the glorious buttery smell that is a pre-requisite for me to qualify as dessert. Maybe fifteen minutes at Resistance 6, tops, for a normal-sized portion.

And did I mention brown/demerara sugar? The kind that melts to form luscious, gooey caramel? This recipe has brown sugar in it. Screw the EFX.

All it needs is some ice-cream or whipped cream on the side. Just so each bite will have steaming-hot baked apple, crispy caramelized oats sizzling in the cold, cold vanilla ice-cream. Mmm. I'm sorry to go all Nigella on you; but it is just so freaking delicious.

Expect people to come haunt the kitchen. There's something about the smell of cinnamon wafting around the kitchen. Amortentia (the Love Potion in Harry Potter?) for me would definitely smell of cinnamon. Cinnamon, Kenzo's Tokyo and just a bit of Sterilium (the antiseptic solution). Too much information, huh?

Back to apples. Go buy 3 or 4 of them. Granny Smith (the green ones) would be tart and crisp, but if you buy Fuji/Washington/Pink Lady/Shimla, you could cut down on the sugar. And plums! The market is rampant with plums. Buy just a couple of them. They'll cook down into a nice, berry-ish sauce that you can spoon over the ice-cream. If you want to do all apples, just serve some more softened vanilla ice-cream on the side

I had only 2 and half apples, but it didn't work out too sweet or anything!

Apple and Plum crumble.

Ingredients:

3 medium-sized apples, peeled, cored and sliced
2 plums, stoned and sliced.
1/2 cup powdered white sugar
2 tsps all-purpose flour
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg

For the crumble:
1/2 cup quick-cooking oats
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup pecans or walnuts, chopped (optional)
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
3-4 tbsps unsalted butter
Method:

1)Preheat the oven to 350 or 175 F.

2Slice the apples and plums and arrange them in slightly greased baking dish. Mix the white sugar, spices and 2 tsps flour. Sprinkle it over the apples+plums. Massage the sugar into the fruit.

3)Prepare the crumble:
In a small dish, combine all the dry ingredients.

Cut the cold butter into the crumble. Mix well with your fingertips so it forms sandy clumps. Spread it over the prepared fruit.

Note: You can also double the crumble topping if you're fond of sugary, crispy things.

4)Bake for about 35-40 minutes.

Recipe source: loosely adapted from various recipes on Allrecipes.com

The ideal way to serve would be to have it piping hot with vanilla-scented whipping cream or ice-cream. Not that it doesn't taste fabulous cold. I have it on good authority (that would be me) that if you should choose to hide a chunk in the vegetable crisper or Milk Chiller (who even looks there?), you'll have yourself a merry, little midnight snack.