The English verb crumble it means 'crumble', 'crumble', and in the kitchen it is used to indicate a crumbly and crunchy mixture similar to a "crumbled" pastry.
Classic crumble: butter and flour
The crumble it is prepared with flour and butter, but not only. A crumble can also be made with dried fruit or leftover biscuits or stale bread. The sense is to roughly mix a dry ingredient and a fat, which is generally butter because it binds better.
Crumble is generally sweet, but it can also be salty and is an excellent solution for preparing recipes for recycling based on fruit or vegetables.
Apple Crumble
The Apple Crumble it is a timeless classic, a real comfort food perfect this season.
You can prepare it with rennet apples or with the golden apples or simply with the apples advanced, even of different varieties, which you must necessarily consume.
Cut them into pieces, also keeping the peel for a more rustic, yet delicious result. Only do this if the apples are untreated.
Arrange them in a buttered baking dish and sprinkle with it sugar, even if it is not necessary, and the cinnamon.
You can enrich them with chopped dried fruit and also add someraisins softened in water or orange juice.
At this point it is time to cover this base with the crumble.
To prepare it just mix butter, sugar and flour.
For a medium-sized dish they will suffice 150 g of flour, 120 g of butter and 100 g of sugar.
Work the mixture by crumbling it in your hands. You don't have to get a loaf like that of shortcrust pastry, just crumbs, hence the name crumble.
Pour this mixture over the apples and bake at 180 ° for about 25 minutesjust long enough to let the apples soften and crunchy crumbs.
It should be served lukewarm.
Pear and hazelnut crumble
Another delicious dessert is pear crumble that smells of hazelnuts.
Prepare the pears as we did with apples in the previous recipe.
Add cinnamon and dried fruit you prefer.
For the crumble, use 70 g of hazelnut flour or chopped hazelnuts and 80 g of 00 flour.
Then add 120 g of butter and 100 g of sugar.
The cooking is the same as the apple crumble and you can use the variety of pears you like best.
Crumble of biscuits
If you have gods cookies advanced, you can use them to prepare a crumble that will appeal to children.
You can also mix different types of shortbread biscuits and coarsely chop them together.
Always use some as a basis seasonal fruit. We have proposed apples and pears, but you can also try peaches, plums and apricots in the summer and you can also mix different fruits together.
For the doses of the crumble, adjust according to the amount of biscuits you have available and simply mix them with the butter, not too much because the shortbreads are already butter-based.
Crumble of dried fruit
A very healthy solution, gluten free and also Vegan, and the crumble made with dried fruit and oats only, without butter other than coconut.
The result is less crunchy, but the taste is amazing.
Mix gods chopped oat flakes with the chopped hazelnuts, almonds, pistachios and walnuts or make a mix of dried fruit to taste, with what you have.
Also add some cinnamon to give a touch of perfume and gods dates chopped for a little sweetness.
Instead of butter, as we said, use coconut butter.
It won't take much, but just the right amount to get a fairly compact compound.
Crumble everything on the fruit base and cook at 180 ° for 25 minutes.
Salty crumble of bread
If you have del leftover bread use it to prepare one vegetable pie very special, with a nice tasty crust. You can really indulge yourself in choosing the vegetables that you will use as a base.
You can cut them sliced and overlap in layers, for example potatoes, courgettes, aubergines and tomatoes, or distribute them in pieces more or less the same size.
This season try a mix of Roman cabbage, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts and broccoli, both raw and steamed.
If you want the vegetables to be very soft, cook them before putting them in the oven, otherwise put them in a pan raw.
Season with oil, salt and pepper and then cover everything with bread crumble.
To prepare it, chop coarsely 200 g of stale bread with 150 g of butter, a clove of garlic, a spoonful of parmesan, salt and parsley.
Bake at 220 ° for about 30 minutes and your rich side dish is ready.
Crumble of rusks and friselle
Instead of bread you can also use rusks is friselle, all that can be chopped to become almost a flour. Always add something tasty and fragrant to yours salty crumble, such as aromatic herbs, grated Parmesan or pecorino and spices if you like them.
They will make the crust very tasty.
If you don't want to use butter, replace it with extra virgin olive oil, but the result will be more of a gratin.
As for vegetables, we invite you to use those that you need to consume urgently, for creative recycling.
If they are in season it is even better.
