There may come a day when you have to turn
on the oven and bake something for dessert, and Fruit Crumble is the
answer. You can do a little work and use up those old apples browning in
your fruit bowl, or you can do the really lazy thing and open some
canned peaches or pears. Use your judgment and increase the sugar on the
fresh fruit if you like, especially if you know the plums you're using
are particularly tart.
A quick
topping of butter, brown sugar, and rolled oats, 25 minutes in the oven,
and you have a hot dessert. The canned fruit kind is ideal for those
winter evenings when you've long since finished dinner and done the
dishes, and still your spouse is cruising through the kitchen, wondering
aloud "isn't there something sweet to eat?".
Make a double or triple batch of the
crumble topping and store it in the freezer in a plastic tub. Pull it
out anytime to sprinkle over fruit in a baking dish for a crumble. You
can also put that same fruit in a frozen pie crust and sprinkle with you
frozen crumbled mixture before baking for a crumble-topped pie.
Instead of a crumble topping, you can
make this into a crust less fruit pie. Buy ready-rolled pie crust in the
refrigerator section. Spread the fruit into a round glass pie dish and
sprinkle with sugar and lemon. Lay the round pie crust on top, cut a few
slits into it with a knife, and sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon. Bake
as directed, until crust is golden brown and fruit is bubbling.
