Apple Crumble Pie

I had a great deal of cinnamon crumble mixture left over from the blueberry muffins I had made recently and wanted to make use of it. After rummaging through the fridge to come up with some fruit to use in my crumble, I found a couple of apples, a pear, and also a ready made pie crust. And thus, the Apple crumble pie was born. There is no definite recipe for the Apple Crumble Pie since it was a very make-it-up-as-you-go recipe, with good results. But I will explain what I did.

I peeled and cored 2 apples and 1 pear then sliced them thinly, threw them into a medium size bowl, and added a squeeze of lemon juice to keep them from browning. Next, I added about 1 teaspoon cinnamon, a dash of nutmeg, 1/4 cup white sugar, 1/4 cup brown sugar, one tablespoon flour to the apples, and combined it all.

I lined the pie crust dough in a 9 inch pie pan and layered the apples and pears, adding a sprinkle of flour to each layer until complete. Then I topped it off with the remaining crumble from my Excellent Blueberry Muffin recipe.

1/2 cup white sugar
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup butter, cubed
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

In a 400 degree f oven I let the pie bake for 30-35 minutes, until the top was browned nicely and I could put a fork through the apples/pears easily.

I let it cool for two hours so that the juices could settle. Then served it with ice cream for the hubby, and just crumble pie for myself. It was very good, and even better the next day. the apples and pear made a great flavor combination and the cinnamon crumb topping melded perfectly with the flavors in the pie. I would make it again.

Excellent Blueberry Muffins

After struggling with trying to find a muffin recipe that didn't end up dense cupcake-like muffins, or muffins that spread while baking and ended up concave instead of rounded, I can now look no more. I have found, possibly, the best muffin base out there. With this base I used blueberries, but any fresh fruit or filling of choice will work great in this recipe.

Ingredients:

(Muffins)
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup white sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 egg
1/3 cup milk
1 cup fresh blueberries

(Crumb Topping)
1/2 cup white sugar
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup butter, cubed
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Grease muffin cups or line with muffin liners.

Combine 1 1/2 cups flour, 3/4 cup sugar, salt and baking powder. Place vegetable oil into a 1 cup measuring cup; add the egg and enough milk to fill the cup. Mix this with flour mixture. Fold in blueberries. Fill muffin cups right to the top, and sprinkle with crumb topping mixture.

To Make Crumb Topping: Mix together 1/2 cup sugar, 1/3 cup flour, 1/4 cup butter, and 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon. Mix with fork, and sprinkle over muffins before baking.

Bake for 20 to 25 minutes in the preheated oven, or until done.

The crumb mixture was too much for the amount of muffins, I ended up with a lot of left over that I'm refrigerating and plan on adding to a berry crisp sometime this week. But unless you plan on making a larger batch or another batch later on, I have halved the ingredients below.

1/4 cup sugar
2 1/2 tablespoons flour
2 tablespoons butter
1/3 teaspoon ground cinnamon

This was the first time that I had ever been instructed to fill up all of the wet ingredients in a measuring cup. The milk was not actually measured out rather than filled in until the cup was full. At first I thought that maybe something was off about that, but I followed the directions to the letter and the muffins turned out excellent! I would also recommend using coarse sugar in place of the crumb mixture if you like.

Recipe Source