CHERRY-ANDALMOND CRUMBLE

“I’d been hankering after a cherry crumble for some time, and a couple of summers ago, extravagantly bought a kilo of cherries and, with this great mound in front of me, set to with a cherry-stoner (which I, in Lucille Ball mode, first used upside down, shooting myself in the forehead with a bloodied kernel) only to find that the crumble was best made not with fresh cherries, but frozen. And here it is, the crumble I needed: sweet-sharp cherries oozing fruitily into the sour pulp of buttersoftened apples and bubbling up brightly around the edges of its crisp but still yielding golden topping. I’ve added almonds, and in many manifestations – extract, ground, flaked – but their presence is a delicate one.”

Serves 4 to 6

EASY

GREAT VALUE Preparation: 25 minutes Cooking: 1 hour

For the crumble topping: flour (or gluten-free flour) 150 g ground almonds 50 g baking powder 1 t (gluten-free if necessary) fine sea salt a pinch cold unsalted butter 125 g sugar 50 g flaked almonds 30 g

For the filling:

Granny Smith apples 375 g unsalted butter 35 g caster sugar 1T frozen sweet pitted cherries 800 g vanilla extract 1t almond extract ¼t

1 To make the crumble topping, put the flour, ground almonds, baking powder and salt into a bowl and mix together.

2 Cut the butter into approx. 1 cm cubes, add to the bowl, and blend into the flour using your fingertips – fluttering the soft pad of your thumb against the soft pads of your fingers – or use a mixer or processor, until you have a mixture that looks like rough, pale oatmeal, with a few flattened pea-sized lumps of floury butter still visible. Add the sugar and use a fork to mix. You can now chill or freeze until needed. 3 To make the filling, peel the apples, then quarter and core them. Cut into approx. 2 cm chunks. 4 Melt the butter in a wide, heavy-based saucepan (that comes with a lid) over a lowish heat, stir in the sugar and add the apples. Give a good stir to mix, then cover the pan, and let the apples cook, still on a fairly low heat, for 20–30 minutes, until they are soft and beginning to break down a little. Stir from time to time so that the apples don’t catch on the bottom of the pan. Remove about a quarter of the apples to a bowl and mash to a rough purée before returning to the pan. 5 Turn up the heat to medium-high and add the frozen cherries, stirring them into the apples and cook, covered, for 3 minutes only, or the cherries will make too much liquid. Remove the lid, and cook for a further 2 minutes by which time the apples will have been absorbed into their redness. It doesn’t matter if the cherries are not completely thawed at this stage.

6 Switch off the heat, stir in the vanilla and almond extracts, and turn the fruit into a 23 cm round pie dish, or whichever ovenproof dish you plan on using. You can let the fruit stand in the dish for up to 3 hours or leave it in the fridge for up to 5 days. 7 When you want to bake the crumble, heat the oven to 190°C. Top with the crumble mixture just before cooking. Try and scatter the crumble evenly over the fruit, without pressing down on it, and make sure you go right to the edges. 8 Sprinkle the flaked almonds on top and cook for 30 minutes by which time the filling will have bubbled up beautifully

“Dinner will kick off with black bread and smoked salmon and a plateful of treacle sausages”

around the edges, the topping will be golden, and the flaked almonds toasted. 9 Let the crumble stand for 15 minutes or so, then serve with cream, custard or ice cream, as you wish.

WINE: Warwick First Lady Rosé 2019