Fresh Fruit Crumble

Yesterday was our Isaac’s twelfth birthday. When we asked what kind of cake he wanted to celebrate, he answered — as he has for as many birthdays as I can remember — “I don’t want a cake, I want a fresh fruit crumble.”

And who can blame him? Sweet juicy berries, warm crumbly crust, topped with a big scoop of vanilla ice cream — it’s almost more than a body can resist.

This time around, we used blackberries. His birthday hits about the time they are ripe for picking, although time constraints didn’t allow us to go hunting this year, so we used store-bought berries — not as much fun to gather, but every bit as delicious to eat.

The recipe we use is one we adapted from Martha Stewart’s Baking Handbook, which has been our go-to guide for years. She used plums in her recipe, but this crumbly crust is also great with peaches, apples, blackberries, or blueberries (pictured below).

There are several pick-your-own farms near Tyler, so our family normally goes every year as soon as the berries are ripe. Working together, we pick all we can and freeze what we can’t eat immediately, to be used later in muffins, pancakes, cobblers, crisps, and crumbles.

But this dish remains our favorite. Try it, and you’ll understand why!

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Fresh Fruit Crumble

Ingredients

2 sticks real cream butter
2¼ cups flour
¾ cup brown sugar (packed)
½ tsp cinnamon
¾ cup granulated sugar
½ tsp salt
½ cup rolled oats
2½ cups blueberries

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Rinse berries in a colander. Set aside to drain.

In separate large bowl, whisk together dry ingredients.

Cut cold butter in using a pastry blender until large clumps form.

Using a rubber spatula, gently mix in oats.

Butter the bottom of a 9” x 13” glass baking dish. Spread blueberries in the bottom of the dish.

Crumble this mixture over the top of the blueberries, covering the fruit as evenly as possible.

Bake for 45-50 minutes, until juices are bubbling and topping is evenly browned. Serve fresh fruit crumble warm with a large scoop of vanilla ice cream.

Love to cook? You can view a categorized list of my other recipe posts here: Our Favorite Recipes.

For even more Flanders family favorites — plus a wealth of ideas for making mealtime memorable — get a copy of my book Sit Down & Eat.

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