Bigger apple crumble w/whole spelt

My sister has been baking this apple crumble regularly. She did it when I was visiting her last and was telling me how she made it work with rice flour or xylitol. And she was right, her crumble was fantastic. Good news for me is that she's been actually reading my blog and found this recipe here. So, the other day, when Hania felt like a fruit cake, I dug an old recipe out and made it ... bigger and better!

Recipe adapted from Gray Apron
time: 20 min preparation + 50 min baking + 10 min cooling

 ingredients 

for apples
7 big (about 200 g or 1/2 lb each) apples
juice from 1 medium lemon
1/3 cup (70 g) sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3 Tablespoons (45 g) butter

for crumble
1 1/4 cup flour = 150 g whole spelt flour - the one I used - OR 175 g regular flour

8 Tablespoons (120 g) cold butter, diced
1/3 cup (75 g) light brown sugar (white OK)
4 Tablespoons (60 g) my own vanilla sugar

 instructions 

Preheat oven to 180C/355F (fan forced function). Butter (extra butter) a large ceramic baking dish.

to prepare apples: Roughly peel your apples. Core them and cut in dice-size chunky pieces.

On a large skillet, melt butter on medium high. Add apples, lemon juice, sugar and cinnamon. Stir and cook for 1 minute.

to prepare crumble: Place butter, sugars and flour in a large bowl. Working fast with your fingers, combine them till all greased, for about 1 minute. 

Transfer apples (OK if still warm/hot) into the baking dish. Drop crumble on top of the fruit. Set the dish into the hot oven for about 50 minutes till juices bubble on the sides.
Remove from the heat. Let it cool for at least 10 minutes and serve.

NOTES NOTES NOTES NOTES NOTES NOTES NOTES NOTES NOTES 

• Renee variety is the type of apples I use for baking;
• I doubled the recommended amount of the fruit but I left the sugar amount the same: the dessert was plenty sweet;
• my sister doesn't sweeten her apples at all, but the Renee variety is particularly tart;
• I didn't bother with peeling the apples all the way this time; most of the flavor is in the skin and just underneath it, so I just gave a rough peel;
• there was plenty of crumble to cover the augmented fruit amount; 
• the dessert turned out just like we wanted - full of beautifully baked apples topped with a perfect crunch;
• ...it was gone before anybody decided to get in the car and get ice cream...