Cooking with Betty Crackpot: Apple Crisp

This is one of the easiest, satisfying desserts you can make and the versatility with it is huge.  I chose to make this particular recipe because my young, almost eight year old roommate, R, had claimed that she'd never had apple crisp before.  If she had, she said it wasn't that memorable.  Well, I wanted to change her life with a memorable apple crisp and I thought Betty would for sure come through for me, since this is a basic, but delicious recipe.  NOTE: I don't normally make my crisp this way, but whatever.  I stayed true to the recipe for the sake of the series!

Apple Crisp, from page 177 of Betty Crocker's Cookbook, 1969 version

4 cups sliced pared tart apples (about 4 medium)
2/3 - 3/4 cup brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup oats
3/4 tsp cinnamon
3/4 tsp nutmeg
1/3 cup butter or margarine, softened

Heat oven to 375F.  Grease square pan, 8x8x2".  Place apple slices in pan.  Mix remaining ingredients thoroughly.  Sprinkle over apples.  Bake 30 minutes or until apples are tender and topping is golden brown.  Serve warm and, if desired, with light cream or ice cream.

I thought this was pretty good.  It was definitely crispy and crunchy.  The flavour and texture was great.  I served it with a bit of whipping cream.

R's verdict: it was "OK."  Well, I guess I didn't change her life after all. 

R's mom, T, loved it though.  We almost ate the whole pan that night.

Huckleberry Slump

The name is catchy, isn't it? When I first came across the Sour Cherry Slump recipe in Baked: New Frontiers in Baking, I knew I just had to make it for the name alone. Alas, two pints of sour cherries are just not doable on my food budget, so I let this recipe go - until I went huckleberry picking this summer! This, in addition to the huckleberry pork loin, was one of my first ideas for using the berries in a unique way.

According to the book, a "slump" is "essentially a twice-removed cousin of the cobbler family, consisting of cooked fruit filling topped with a biscuit crust that's cooked entirely on the stovetop" (page 44). The slump refers to how the biscuit topping "slumps" over the filling as it cooks.

The recipe for the original sour cherry version can be found online here.

Huckleberry Slump (adapted by me from Baked: New Frontiers in Baking by Matt Lewis & Renato Poliafito)

For the biscuit topping

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• Raw sugar for topping (optional)

For the huckleberry filling

• 3 cups huckleberries
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• juice of half a lemon (use some zest if you have it, too; I didn't)

Make the biscuit topping

In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. With a wooden spoon, stir in the melted butter and mix until combined. Add 1/4 cup of the sour cream and stir. Add a few heaping tablespoons of the remaining sour cream, stirring between each addition, until the dough feels wet. You may end up using slightly less than the 1/2 cup of the sour cream. Set aside while you prepare the huckleberries.

Make the huckleberries

In a well-seasoned 8-inch or 8-1/2-inch cast-iron skillet, gently combine the berries, sugar, and lemon juice. (I used my nifty cast iron KitchenAid dutch oven and it worked great.)

Cover the skillet with a lid or a piece of tight-fitting foil and bring the mixture to a rapid boil over medium heat.

When the mixture reaches a boil, remove the skillet from the heat and scoop heaping tablespoons of the biscuit topping over the berries, covering as much surface area as possible. If using, sprinkle the top with raw sugar. Cover the skillet tightly and return it to low heat. Cook for about 15 minutes. Do not remove the lid. After 15 minutes, check the topping for doneness; it should be dry to the touch. (The topping will not brown the way it would in an oven.)

Serve the slump hot from the pan.

Can we all say YUM? Holy huckleberries, man, this was wonderful! Really quick & easy and totally delicious. The huckleberries cook down and thicken and you get an almost jam-like consistency. The biscuits, which are more like a dumpling, are light and tender. I'm only sorry I put off making this so long because it was super! I will definitely be making this again, and it's versatile, too; you can probably use any seasonal fruit you want to. Excellent!

Camping Grub 2009 Part 1: Breakfast

Camping last week was excellent! The weather was perfect, except for the last night & the morning we packed up, when it rained. But other than that, it was hot and sunny, and the lake was still nice enough to swim in.

And of course we ate well! Let's start my 2009 Camping Grub series off with breakfast.

On Morning #1, we opted for a cooked, greasy camping breakfast of bacon & eggs, cooked over the camp stove. We also had toast made from a loaf of no-knead bread I made the day before we left. The camping toaster gadget was broken, so my SIL toasted the bread gently over the BBQ.There is something about cooking food on a camp stove out in the woods just makes everything taste way better!

On Morning #2, we had a super easy breakfast made by my SIL before we left: homemade peach crisp, made with local peaches. We had this with some vanilla yogurt and it was excellent!On Morning #3, it was raining, so we had breakfast in the trailer. I had made some granola at home and we had it with, again, vanilla yogurt. The recipe for the granola is here, but I used some coconut in it, and only used whole almonds as I was out of hazelnuts. Yum!
The full camping Flickr set, including all our food, some gorgeous scenery, and a gigantic bug, is here.

Pear & Apple Crisp for a Crowd

My lastest work project on the dessert front included a huge bag of locally grown pears, picked by the folks at the residents.

The cook and I mulled over the possibilities we had within our bugetary limitations, and decided simple was best: pear crisp. Who doesn't love a good crisp? And my strawberry rhubarb one from a couple of weeks ago was a hit, so we thought it would be a good bet. (Incidentally, the chocolate strawberry shortcakes were also a HUGE hit!)

What I hadn't anticipated was the nuisance of peeling all the pears, and I had some time restrictions to work around. After I'd made my daily muffin quota, I had to peel like a maniac to get enough pears for a crisp that had to feed about 35 people. The cook helped me peel, but I knew it wasn't going to work. Luckily, there was a whole bucket of apple pie filling in the fridge, so I decided to make this a pear & apple crisp.

I gave myself 35 minutes to peel as many pears as I could. To this I added 1 cup of brown sugar, 4 tbsp cornstarch, and some cinnamon & nutmeg.

Then I scooped in a whole pile of apple pie filling. This stuff is so good I could just eat it by the spoonful!

I then mixed the pear & apple fillings together in the pan.

Onto the topping: 4 cups oats, 1 cup flour, 1 cup packed brown sugar, cinnamon & nutmeg, and about 1 1/4 cups cold margarine (no butter at this place, but I make do).

It smelled great as it cooked, let me tell you! Alas, my shift ended before it came out of the oven, so I'll have to wait for my next shift to get any feedback. I'm pretty confident that they liked this, though!