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Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Plum Crumble Slice

Now the evenings are getting darker, my mind is slipping into 'comfort food mode'. Which means taking advantage of all those great fruits out there and cooking them until they turn to mush, then slapping a topping on them. I love it.

Plum Crumble Slice
You will need:
About 10 plums
1 Apple (Doesn't really matter what kind but i've got a thing for Pink Ladies at the moment - oo-er!)
A handful of sultanas
Lemon Juice, Cinnamon & Nutmeg
1oz Sugar
For the Pastry -
200g Plain Flour
145g Butter, cubed
2oz Caster Sugar
A Beaten egg
For the Crumble topping -85g Softened Butter, 85g Plain Flour, 85g Soft Brown Sugar,1og Ground Almonds

1. The pastry is made by rubbing the flour and butter together until breadcrumbs are formed, then adding the beaten egg to it (in stages) to bring it together. You won't need all of the egg, and the dough should be just sticky, but not wet. Cover the ball in cling film and chill for 45 minutes.

2. Prepare your fruit. Peel and core the apple and put in a bowl with the plums which should also be cored and chopped however you want them. Sprinkle with the Sugar, lemon juice, and spices, mix, and cover.

3. Heat the oven to 200c. Make the topping by making the breadcrumbs again, but this time with all that sugar in. You want the breadcrumbs lumpier this time, though.

4. Roll the chilled pastry flat, not too thin, and line the baking dish with it, making edges and a tart-style base. Arrange your fruit in the base, and then top with the crumble. Don't waste any juices the fruit may have made.

5. Cook for 20 mins on 200c to brown the top, then drop to 180c for another 30 mins to cook through.

Serve hot, with Vanilla Ice-Cream, of course. I had no beer with this, but if I would, I'd have gone for a Schneider Aventinus, or a Chimay Red. The cinnamon flavours would go really well with those beers, I think...




6 comments:

Katie said...

pink ladies! Over priced designer junk! Think of the food miles! What about Coxes, Jonagold, Worcesters all in the shops now. I have a punnet of plums in atm- I was thinking of ways to cook them.

Anonymous said...

The late frosts took all the blossom of our plum tree this year so we have precious few plums, if I can get enough together I'll try this recipe.

On the plus side the Egremont Russet tree is bent double under all its fruit!

Leigh said...

yeah, the lame summer has slaughtered my toms this year, hardly any worth doing anything with.

Scott at Real Epicurean said...

I'm a massive fan of a good crumble. Simple things please me :)

Leigh said...

yeah - it's not rocket science, its not original, it's just Good. The Good Stuff, indeed. It's a theme we always come back to in both food and beer - simplicity.

Anonymous said...

On the subject of tomatoes, I got enough to get a few blocks of frozen roast tomato and onion pasata but that's about it, still it should give me a taste of pure summer come the dark days of February and that's priceless!