When I had an overabundance of plums this year, I had a lot of work to do to wash and pit them and freeze them in ziplocs.  But the time has come to start turning them into  plum desserts, a reward for my hard work. I cut the plums open so the two sides are like wings joined in the middle. Then I can open them up to put on the bottom crust of the dessert.

Be warned – this is an “about” recipe.  You’ll figure out what works for you.

This dessert is easy to make, especially if you have a food processor.

• Put about a cup and a half of flour in the food processor with a quarter cup of white sugar and about 3/4 cup of butter. Pulse the mixture until it is crumbly as you would do if you were making a pie. BUT, we’re not going to add liquid to make a pie dough.
• At this point I add about half a cup of rolled oats (optional) to the mixture and just stir it in so the food processor doesn’t turn the oats into flour.
• Then pour about 3/4 of the crumbly mixture into the bottom of a baking dish. I like to use my rectangular one. Spread the crumbly mixture into the dish and press it down with your hand to make a tightly packed “crust.” No need to butter the pan because there is plenty of butter in the crumble mix.
• Take the thawed (or fresh if you have them) plums and place them skin-side down on the crust, covering it completely with one layer of plums.  By putting the plums skin-side down, the plum juice doesn’t soak into the crust and make it mushy.
• Once the plums are in place, sprinkle them with cinnamon and a light sprinkle of brown sugar. Then sprinkle the last quarter of the crumble on top of the plums. At this point I like to put some large sprouted oat flakes on top to give them a bit of crunch, but it works fine with regular oat flakes too.
• I use my mini oven to bake the plum crumble, but it works very well in the big oven too. 350 degrees for about 35 to 40 minutes. You can tell it’s done when the topping is golden brown and the plum juice is bubbling around the edges.

Let it cool a bit and  then cut it into pieces of whatever size you like. If there is any left, you can freeze it and take out pieces any time you want, to thaw in the microwave.

 

The plum crumble is good with or without ice cream or whipping cream, but a cup of tea or coffee is perfect with it.

 

This crumble also works well with apple cut into slices. I suppose you could try it with all sorts of fruit. That would be interesting to experiment with. Pears would be good, maybe substituting powdered ginger for the cinnamon.

I hope you try it and enjoy it.