Madhouse recipe : Kitchen Clearout Apple Crumble

The last few days have been decidedly nippy here, with a thick sheet of frost across the pavements all day long and a breeze cold enough to make your nose twitch when you step outside ! As Pierre has been off sick for the last couple of days with an ear infection, I decided to head into the kitchen and rustle up something warm and comforting to make us smile.

I'd received some cooking spice blends from Steenbergs to try out and I decided that now would be the perfect time to use them. I had a choice between Organic Lebkuchen - a blend of  cinnamon, cloves, ginger, allspice, coriander seed, green cardamom, nutmeg and mace, perfect for recreating German style biscuits and bakes (£2.65 for 40g) - and Organic Apple Pie Mix - a combination of cassia, allspice, coriander, nutmeg, ginger, clove and vanilla (£2.60 for 45g). Just removing the lid and having a quick sniff mentally whisks you back to carefree childhood days, running inside from playing with your friends and tucking into a steaming bowl of apple pie. Just what the doctor ordered on a cold winter's day !

I decided to create a recipe based on what was in the kitchen that needed using up - that would be a bowlful of apples and some Ready Brek then. The whole thing was polished off in minutes so I'll definitely be making this again. The spice blend gives it a lovely depth of flavour and the smell in the kitchen was wonderful !

Kitchen Clearout Apple Crumble

ingredients :

120g Ready Brek (or use rolled oats for a fuller texture)

100g demerera sugar

1tsp baking powder

80g butter

3tsp Steenberg Apple Pie mix (or you could use cinnamon)

5 Granny Smith apples

35g (3tbsp) butter

2tbsp flour

1tbsp lemon juice

3tbsp milk

60g demerera sugar

Turn on the oven on at 180° to preheat. Put the first five ingredients into a bowl together.

Start rolling it through your fingers to combine.

Once the butter has been nicely worked into the oats, pop the bowl in the fridge while you prepare the apple filling. (I would have added some whole rolled oats here for extra texture, but when I went to investigate, I discovered that I'd run out - oops !)

Peel and slice the apples. Reserve.

Melt the butter (I used the microwave but you could do it in a pan if you prefer) and stir in the flour.

Add the lemon juice and milk and stir, then add the demerera sugar. (I was using up the end of a bag, but brown sugar would work just fine too.) Mix it all together. 

Then add the apple slices and give it all a good mix until they're evenly coated.

Return them to the dish.

Pour over the topping and press down with your hands until the apples are completely covered.

Bake for about half an hour until the topping has "set".

Serve with ice cream or custard for extra decadence. This should be the dictionary definition for comfort food !

Adding to this month's #KitchenClearout linky as it used up some apples, Ready Brek and the end of a bag of demerera sugar that were lurking in the cupboards.