Easy Oat Crumble Topping Recipe (2024)

FAQs

How do you keep crumble topping crisp? ›

Butter, which encourages both browning and crispness, is the magic ingredient in getting your topping just right, so follow the recipe instructions. But if you feel your topping is still too dry and crumbly, (even for a crumble) add a bit more melted butter, a tablespoon at a time.

As its name suggests, crumb topping is a dessert topping. It's a simple mixture of butter, sugar, and flour, and is typically used to top pies or muffins prior to baking for a crunchy, sweet contrast.

A well-made crumb should be firm yet tender, and chewy, with big chunks—like granola. The best way to achieve this is to use cold cubed butter. Using room-temperature or melted butter will cause the topping to spread out and flatten when it bakes, rather than standing pert and perky.

First, adding a teaspoon of baking powder to the flour mixture makes the crumble topping more tender. Second, using cold butter and working it into the flour mixture makes for a pastry-like topping reminiscent of pie crust.

You can get the top to brown faster either by adding some extra sugar to the top (sprinkle it on) or toasting it under the broiler for a minute or two once the rest has baked. It is also possible your oven is miscalibrated. Maybe it is cooler than you think.

You need to stop rubbing the fat into the flour so efficiently! Leaving lumps in it is what makes those lovely crunchy bits. I also recently read that crumbled ginger nuts make a lovely addition.

This can't be easier for perfect results every time. If you are wondering what the difference is between crumb topping and streusel, not much is the answer. Both are crumb toppings containing the same ingredients but streusel often has more sugar, cinnamon, nuts and or oats included.

So what's a crumble vs. a crisp? A crumble is just a crisp without oats in the streusel. It may feature nuts, but the streusel topping is usually a simple combination of butter, flour, and sugar that is more clumpy than that of a crisp.

Scatter butter over flour in a wide, shallow bowl. Press down on butter with pastry blender, working up and down until all butter pieces are small pea-size lumps and covered in flour. Pro: This method allows you to properly control the exact size of the butter lumps without adding heat from your hands.

Make the crumble topping and store in a sealed plastic bag in the fridge for up to 24 hours. Keep for later? Store the uncooked crumble in a covered dish and keep in the fridge for up to 24 hours before cooking or freeze for up to three months.

Why is my crumble topping doughy? ›

For the crunchiest topping we recommend baking it separately. Why does my crumble topping look like dough? This is usually down to the butter being too warm when mixed together.

Then, make sure to bake the crumble long enough so that the fruit filling comes to a profuse simmer at the edges of the pan. This shows that the cornstarch has been activated enough to thicken the juices, turning them supple and silky.

Absolutely! As for the reverse, you probably don't want to use bread flour in place of AP for cookies, cakes, and tender pastries. But, if you've run out of AP and need just a few tablespoons of flour to make a roux, a crumble topping, or to butter and flour a cake pan, bread flour will work just fine.

You need enough butter in your topping, try both melted or cold cut into the dry ingredients. Also, there needs to be enough texture to keep it from just flattening into the fruit below. I like to use oats or granola as part of the dry ingredients for my crisps, nuts, too.

Thankfully for us, the folks in their test kitchen came up with a pretty great trick to maintain the crisp factor: they suggest macerating the peach slices (or whatever fruit you're using) with the sugar and salt called for in the recipe (letting them hang out together for awhile to release their sweet juices) and then ...

Make the crumble topping and store in a sealed plastic bag in the fridge for up to 24 hours. Keep for later? Store the uncooked crumble in a covered dish and keep in the fridge for up to 24 hours before cooking or freeze for up to three months.

Once completely cooled, cover the dish with the fruit and store in the fridge; store the topping in a covered container at room temperature. Before serving, spread the topping over the jammy fruit filling and reheat for about 15 minutes in a 350°F oven.