Festive Blackberry Crumble with Brown Butter, Pecans and Oats

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A wonderful thing about Festive Blackberry Crumble with Pecans, Oats is that it uses the blackberries previously used to make Festive Gin with Blackberries, Cinnamon and Bay. What a hardship – two delicious recipes, bursting with the flavours of Christmas, in one!

When you strain the gin, save the blackberries and cook them to use in this crumble. However, if you haven’t made the gin, you can still make this recipe using fresh or frozen blackberries, or, indeed, any fruit of your choice. 

Although a classic crumble is made from just flour, sugar and butter, there are many variations. Browning the butter adds a nutty taste to complement the crunchy pecan nuts and oats, the brown sugar introduces a slight caramel flavour and the nuts and oats add, not just extra nutrients and seasonal flavour, but a delicious crunch. It works with many different kinds of fruit – I particularly enjoy it with apples.

Please see Eve’s Pudding with Apple and Almonds for details of how to prepare apples which you can use in this crumble.

How to cook the blackberries:

The blackberries, soaked in gin with cinnamon, cloves and all spice are saved from making the gin, the spices are removed and they are cooked with some sugar until soft.

Let this cool and top with a nutty, oaty crunchy topping, cook until crispy and serve with ice cream, cream or custard. It is so delicious. Unfortunately I forgot to photograph this stage!

I used:

• 900g blackberries
• 225g caster or granulated sugar
• 2 tablespoons water

How to make it:

1. Remove the cinnamon and spices from the blackberries. The blackberries will look very plump because they are swollen with gin.
2. Place all the ingredients in a saucepan and bring to a gentle simmer.
3. Cook for 5 – 15 minutes, or until cooked to your liking.
4. The blackberries will make a lot of juice when you cook them – strain the juice from the stewed blackberries but save it to pour over the crumble when you serve it.
5. Transfer the blackberries to a baking dish and set them aside to cool.

NB If you do not have enough/any blackberries from the gin, you can:

• use fresh blackberries,
• use fresh raspberries, or
• add some peeled, cored and chopped apple. Bramleys are best.

Now make the Festive Blackberry Crumble with Brown Butter, Pecans and Oats

Collect all your ingredients together:

• cooled cooked blackberries (see above) and juice
• unsalted butter
• pecan nuts, chopped
• plain/all-purpose flour
• jumble porridge oats
• caster sugar
• soft brown sugar
• fine salt

Now made this luscious festive crumble topping:

1. Melt the butter in a large sauce pan and cook until it darkens and smells nutty. (For more information to making brown butter, see here.)
2. Chop the pecan nuts.
3. Add the pecans, flour, oats, sugars and salt to the pan and mix well.
4. Cover the blackberries with the crumble and bake in the centre of a preheated oven for 30 minutes or until lightly browned and crispy.
5. To serve: add some vanilla ice cream to the centre of the crumble and pour over a little juice. Serve the remainder of the juice separately.

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Made this recipe?

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