7 Ways to Completely Screw Up an Apple Crisp (2024)

FAQs

How do you thicken apple crisp filling? ›

Adding cornstarch and flour to the apple mixture will help bring your crisp's filling together. You want to make sure you have a nice balance of the sweet and tart in your dessert.

How to Store Apple Crisp. You'll want to cover your apple crisp well and put it in the fridge once everyone is full. This will keep it fresh.

The best way to prevent a watery apple crisp is to use a thickener in the filling – some recipes use flour, but I've chosen to use cornstarch in this recipe (or arrowroot starch, which can be substituted 1:1 for cornstarch) because I think it provides superior thickening power.

Baking in a moderate (350-375˚F) gives the fruit time to break down into that saucy goodness. Go too hot and the crumble topping with get too dark before the fruit is ready. You'll be left with too-hard fruit and a burnt topping, which will make both you and us sad.

Cook just until tender crisp checking the apples with a fork. Some apples are juicier than others. If you would like your filling thicker, combine 1 tablespoon cornstarch with 1 tablespoon water.

All-purpose flour is an easy solution, as you're sure to have it in your pantry. Since it's lower in starch, you'll use more of it than you would higher-starch thickeners. Quick-cooking tapioca makes filling bright and clear, but also gives it a stippled and somewhat sticky texture.

The best way to thicken runny apple pie filling before baking it is to add some cornstarch, tapioca starch, or flour to your mix.

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. If you think it's too wet, add a little more flour to soak up the extra butter.

If you use more butter than the recipe calls for, the crumb topping will be melted and greasy. If you don't use enough butter it will be dry and floury.

A pastry chef friend shared the technique. Instead of sprinkling the raw crumbs on top of the fruit, where they absorb the juices and turn a little mushy on their undersides, he spread them out in a pan and baked them separately, until crisp and cookielike.

Why put baking powder in crumble topping? ›

A crisp contains oats in the topping, while a crumble does not. Baking powder can also be added to a crumble topping (like it is here) to ensure it's extra light and tender.

If you don't leave the pie in the oven long enough your thickener doesn't get to the necessary temperature and time to thicken your filling. You want to see thick bubbling! The bubbling of the filling is activating the natural gelatin of your fruit as well as your thickeners.

We like tapioca in blueberry, cherry or peach pies. Arrowroot, unlike cornstarch, is not broken down by the acid in the fruit you are using so it is a good choice for fruit with a higher content of acidity such as strawberries or blackberries.

Trick one: Cornflour.

This isn't totally traditional but using cornflour is a cheat's way of thickening up the fruit mixture sauce so that it doesn't become too watery. As well as this, it keeps your crumble topping crispy because the additional water that cooks out of the rhubarb can make it go soggy.