Vegan Apple Crumble Recipe - Shane & Simple (2024)

FAQs

What is the secret to crunchy crumble? ›

However, we also love adding porridge oats for extra chewiness, as in these recipes for very-berry oat crumble and American-style apple crisp. Chopped and toasted nuts such as pecans, almonds or hazelnuts also make a lovely addition to a traditional crumble, for taste as well as an extra-crunchy texture.

To Make the Crumble Topping

In a medium bowl, combine the vegan butter and plain white flour. Using two knives or a pastry cutter, chop up the vegan butter into tiny pieces until evenly distributed throughout the flour. Add the rolled oats, sugar, flaky sea salt and cinnamon.

Butter, which encourages both browning and crispness, is the magic ingredient in getting your topping just right, so follow the recipe instructions. But if you feel your topping is still too dry and crumbly, (even for a crumble) add a bit more melted butter, a tablespoon at a time.

In a large bowl, toss together apples, granulated sugar, 2 tablespoons flour, lemon juice, cinnamon, and 1/4 teaspoon salt; transfer to prepared dish. In a bowl with an electric mixer, beat butter with brown sugar until fluffy. Mix in 1 cup flour and 1/2 teaspoon salt until large pieces form. Scatter over filling.

The main reason your crumble topping isn't crunchy is probably because you haven't used Demerara sugar. Although, it could also be that you've got your topping ingredient quantities wrong: either too much or not enough flour and butter alongside the sugar.

When added to cake, cookie, pie filling and shortbread recipes, cornstarch helps create a crumbly and tender dessert-like texture. Commercially, cornstarch is often used as an anti-caking agent.

In baking, you can use vegan butter, applesauce, dairy-free yogurt, coconut oil, coconut butter, olive oil, nut butter, mashed banana and mashed avocado. In cooking, you can use olive oil, coconut oil, vegetable stock, or avocado oil to replace butter.

Cobbler: A fruit dessert made with a top crust of pie dough or biscuit dough but no bottom crust. Crisp/crumble: In Alberta, the terms are mostly interchangeable. Both refer to fruit desserts similar to cobbler but made with a brown sugar streusel topping sometimes containing old-fashioned rolled oats.

Meatless Vegan Crumbles | Vegan Ground Beef | MorningStar Farms®

If you use more butter than the recipe calls for, the crumb topping will be melted and greasy. If you don't use enough butter it will be dry and floury.

How to make a crumble more crumbly? ›

To do this properly, you first need to make sure that the topping is still a little lumpy. A crumble topping is made by rubbing butter into dry ingredients (flour, sugar and sometimes ground almonds, too). Once this is done, wet your hands, and mix the topping even more, allowing it to form into larger clumps.

Using plenty of butter is they key to a good crumble topping, but take care not to over-mix when rubbing it in as that can make your crumble doughy (if you use a food processor take particular care). You can use your fingers to encourage clumps after rubbing in the butter (watch the How-to video below).

A crumble is just a crisp without oats in the streusel. It may feature nuts, but the streusel topping is usually a simple combination of butter, flour, and sugar that is more clumpy than that of a crisp.

“I can't stand crumbles that have a layer of floury sugary dust on top. They're supposed to be chunky and craggy, with big pieces of crumble on top. By freezing your topping, it makes it harden just slightly and that means the texture will be nice and crispy when it's cooked.”

First, adding a teaspoon of baking powder to the flour mixture makes the crumble topping more tender. Second, using cold butter and working it into the flour mixture makes for a pastry-like topping reminiscent of pie crust. Pro tip: Crumble topping freezes incredibly well and can be kept on hand for crumble anytime.

A well-made crumb should be firm yet tender, and chewy, with big chunks—like granola. The best way to achieve this is to use cold cubed butter. Using room-temperature or melted butter will cause the topping to spread out and flatten when it bakes, rather than standing pert and perky.

Cobbler: A fruit dessert made with a top crust of pie dough or biscuit dough but no bottom crust. Crisp/crumble: In Alberta, the terms are mostly interchangeable. Both refer to fruit desserts similar to cobbler but made with a brown sugar streusel topping sometimes containing old-fashioned rolled oats.