Traditional British: Perfect Apple Crumble

Apple. My favourite fruit. Especially in autumn, when the first fresh red apples start to appear, it is almost a ritual for me to make apple crumble. Generally, you need to use sweet apples for this dessert, but if you are crazy for apples (like me) it really doesn't matter which type you use. Sometimes, I use green apples with red apples or yellow apples. I tend to mix them. Crumble is a traditional British dessert, especially made in the winter. Any type of juicy fruits can be used in this dessert. Pears, plums and cherries are the second best in my opinion. I even made a cherry and plum crumble. It was amazing. Sweet and sour, perfect with whipped double cream or vanilla ice cream. Imagine this: The house smells like delicious cinnamon and butter, you take the crumble out of the oven and immediately serve with cold ice cream. You take the first spoon  and see the steam coming out of the cooked apples while the ice cream is softly melting on top. Use my crumble topping to make  delicious desserts. It is so good! Crumble is not preferable in the summer, so before those heat waves hit us, try this mouth-watering indulgence. =)

Ingredients:
150 gr brown sugar
300 gr flour
5 medium sized cooking apples
200 gr butter
A pinch of salt  
2 tea spoons of cinnamon
1 tea spoon of ginger
Juice of 2 lemons
Juice of one orange
Grated rind of one orange or lemon (preferably orange)

How to:

1. First of all, take out the deep baking dish for your crumble. The deeper the dish, the juicer the dessert. Flat and wide trays are not suitable for this recipe because you want your crumble to be juicy. Remember, this is not a pie, it is a British crumble.

2. Squeeze the lemons and orange inside the bowl, add the cinnamon an rind of one orange. Next, wash and peel the apples. Peeling is not mandatory, but it is better if you do it. Chop the apples into small dice and put inside the bowl. Since they will be waiting inside lemon juice, they will not go brown.

3. For the crumble topping, we need room temperature butter. You should mix the butter and flour first by using your fingertips, and then add the brown sugar, cinnamon and ginger. Alternatively, you can put everything in a food processor and mix in high speed. Don't forget to add a pinch of salt to highten the flavours. 

4. Now the mixture looks like bread crumbs. Pur over the fruits in the bowl and press lightly with your palm. 

5. Cook in the pre-heated oven of 190 degrees Celsius for 40 minutes. When the topping is crispy and golden, the apples are soft inside the juice take it out of the oven.

6. Serve when warm in a small bowl with some ice cream or whipped double cream. Eat and enjoy! 

  

 Ready to go in the oven!

This is my plum and cherry crumble. If you like sourish sweet desserts, you should give this a try.

English Tea Bread or Bram Brack

This is a traditional bread I learned from my English mother-in-law. It is so yummy and light! It is commonly known as an Irish recipe -which is special to Halloween. Today I will share my take on the bram brack. I give it another name: English Tea Bread. Traditionally, it is made with only tea. However, in my cake mixture, I have a little bit of milk, plus walnuts and some cinnamon. The best thing about this cake is it has no oil in it. So, when you bake this bread, try to serve it when it is still warm, with butter and jam. It is perfect for your tea time. Make this cake and leave on your counter for a week, it will be fresh. It is pretty filling, so good for the young ones when they come back from school as well.  It is very easy to make. Although there is just one tip my mother-in-law told me. Before using the raisins or sultanas, soak them in tea for at least two hours. It is not compulsory but better to do it. :)

How to:
2 cups of strong brewed tea 
2,5 cups of flour
3 eggs
2 teaspoons of baking powder
2 cups of white sugar
1/4 cup of milk
1 cup of chopped walnuts
1 cup of raisins/sultanas
1 heap teaspoon of cinnamon

How to:

1. Soak the raisins in cold tea. Leave for at least a couple of hours. (You can do this one day before).  Brew some tea and leave it to cool. In the same way, you can use your leftover tea. =)

2. Mix all of the ingredients in a deep bowl, pour into a rectangular bread tin and bake for 50 minutes in 175 degrees.

3. Serve with butter and jam for tea. Bonne appetite!

 

 

It is still good with coffee the next day. 

Crunchy Caramel Cups

Very quick and practical, easy to make, this recipe will be a life saver for your dinner parties and kids' birthdays. This is my latest post from my Turkish blog, so I'll start with this one. It makes me feel like it's a nice beginning, the first recipe being a very easy, very yummy, light dessert. You can serve these cups with or without ice cream on top, it's up to you. Also, I specifically used caramel biscuits, the lightly burnt flavour, plus the crunchy texture of the biscuits work very well. You can choose to use ginger biscuits or crunchy cookies or any other type you fancy. That is the best thing about deserts in cups, you get the main formula and you can experiment with flavors and tastes. All you need is something creamy, something crunchy and something mellow. In this recipe I used delicious little local bananas with dried coconut because I think these two tastes go very well, both exotic, both warm and both leave a tingling sensation on your tongue. My other favourite combinations are chocolate and hazelnuts; caramel and milk; rose and pistachio (I'll write more about it soon, you can create amazing desserts especially by using rose flavored Turkish delights); or cocoa and gum mastic. I really like the fact that with a recipe like this, you are flexible. You can use bits and pieces from your kitchen cupboards. Instead of bananas, you can use strawberries, raspberries, pineapples; instead of decorating with chocolate chips, you can add hundreds and thousands or crushed peanuts, candies or you can try shaving chocolate, or add wafers. I think I've said too much, let's cut to the chase! Bon apetite.

Ingredients:
2,5 cups of milk
2 soup spoons of rice flour (or corn starch)
1 soup spoon flour
1 soup spoon margarine
4 soup spoons of granulated sugar (if you really have a sweet tooth, you can make it 5 or 6 spoonfuls)
1/2 a packet of Lotus caramel biscuits (byou can use ginger biscuits, digestives or any other type of crunchy biscuit or cookie you like)
2 soup spoons of dried and shredded coconuts
2 little bananas
1 packet of vanilla sugar or preferably, half a vanilla pod

How to:
1. Pour in the milk, rice flour, flour, sugar and margarine in a sauce pan and cook until it thickens. Generally, I don't tend to use margarine in my recipes, but with this one I thought a little goes a long way. So when you add only a spoon of margarine, it'll really transform the taste and make your pudding more creamy. Once it starts to boil and makes little bubbles in and aroun, turn off the heat.
2. Add the vanilla and bananas and mash all up with a hand blender. The bananas have to blend in the mixture smoothly, if you see some tiny bits, leave them as they are and they make your pudding rustic. Then add the dried coconuts and mix with a spoon.
3. Take out your cups or glasses and pour in two spoonfuls of pudding, top it with the crunched biscuits, then do this one more time to create another layer. In this step, I didn't mash the biscuits so much, I wanted to have big chunks at the same time. 
4. After you add two layers of pudding and biscuits top everything up with the rest of the pudding and decorate with chocolate chips. Don't forget to add your chocolate chips, when the pudding has cooled down, otherwise the chocolate chips will melt and look messy. In my picture above, I used two different glasses to show two different presentations. It's up to us to get creative! This recipe is very good with kids as well, it has fresh fruit and milk, so you can choose their favourite chocolate and candies. Bon apetite!