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.

Meringue Cookies

Meringues were the fun snacks of our childhood.  Whenever we entered a patisserie, my sister and me would want a packet of these fluffy treats, just because they looked beautiful. It has been on my mind for some time and finally, I was able to make them. It is really easy, nothing to worry about. You need a little bit of patience, that's all. If you have an automatic mixer, it is nothing because you leave the machine on full speed and let it mix for 10 minutes. Because it was my first attempt, I went along with two egg whites and half a cup of sugar. Then I added a bit of cocoa, which gave my meringues a nice shine.

Ingredients: 

2 egg whites

1/2 cup of sugar

1 teaspoon of cocoa

A pinch of salt

How to: 

1. The important tip is the egg whites have to be room temperature, not cold. So before you start, take out your eggs from the fridge and let them wait for a while. After that, the second important tip is your oven must be warm enough. So, start you oven before you whip the eggs. 

2. Separate the egg whites and egg yolks, put the egg whites in a deep bowl. Whisk them for a couple of minutes, then add the sugar and a pinch of salt and put your mixer to high speed and whisk for 10 minutes, or until the egg whites become silky, creamy, fluffy and pretty tough.

3. I didn't want my meringues to be pale white, so I tried to add a little bit of cocoa powder to it. It made no difference to the taste and they looked amazing.

4. Once the cocoa was mixed into the batter, I put it in a clean bag, cut the corner and squeezed my meringue in small lumps. You can use pastry bags with different shapes.

5. For my first time, I tried different shapes and sizes. I baked them for 25 minutes in 130 degrees oven. Then took them out and let them to cool. They were crunchy on the outside but chewy on the inside. If you don't want them to be chewy, bake them longer.

6. After they cooled down completely, I melted some milk chocolate and dipped half of the meringue cookies in this. It was absolutely fantastic! 

First time; first meringue cookies. Inevitably, some weren't looking very nice shape-wise. :)

  The ones dipped in chocolate were my favourite. Mmm, guess why?

Easy Apple and Cherry Pie

So simple, so quick for every day and it is a pretty light recipe. Made with mainly fresh apples and some cherry jam, this pie can take other fruits such as strawberries, cherries, blueberries, raspberries, peaches, apricots, pears and nuts. I first made this in autumn when first fresh apples were on the market and I wanted to sweeten them with my home-made thick cherry jam, instead of using only sugar. With a very thin and crispy base, yummy-smelling cinnamony topping this easy pie will win your heart.

Ingredients:
4 small sweet apples
Juice of one orange
Juice of one lemon
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
Thick cherry jam

130 gr of flour
3 table spoons of butter
1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon
2 teaspoons of granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon of salt

How to:
1. First squeeze the lemon and orange and pour the juice inside a bowl. Peel and chop the apples in small pieces, put them inside the orange and lemon juice. You can add the rind of either the orange or lemon if you like. Especially, the orange rind will give an amazing flavour. In this recipe I focused on cinnamon, so didn't add either of them.
2. Add the cinnamon and toss all of them together. Now add 3-4 tablespoons of thick cherry jam, with the cherries inside. Alternatively, you can add any other jam you like, but make sure it has little juice and big pieces of fruits. This is the only sweet the pie topping has, so try to adjust it to your taste.
3. Now mix all of the ingredients to make a pie pastry and chill for 15 minutes. Use this time to clean up your kitchen, heat your oven and prepare your pie tray. Once the pie crust is ready, roll it out on a clean counter. A small tip here: Instead of using a rolling pin, try rolling your dough with a cold bottle from the fridge. The coldness will help the dough to spread without crumbling.
4. Leave a small piece of the dough aside and take the rest and spread on your baking tray. Pour the apple mixture on top of the dough. Cut small shapes with the leftover pie pastry to decorate. Easy as that. :)
5. Next, the yummy pie goes into the 175 degrees oven for 35-45 minutes. Eat and enjoy!