A Big Little Recipe has the smallest-possible ingredient list and big everything else: flavor, creativity, wow factor. Psst—we don't count water, salt, black pepper, and certain fats (specifically, 1/2 cup or less of olive oil, vegetable oil, and butter), since we're guessing you have those covered. Today, we’re baking a plum crisp with a trick up its sleeve streusel.
I worked as a baker for almost three years, peeling apples, shaping baguettes, frosting cakes, scooping cookie dough, flipping Spanish tortillas, and listening to Lorde. But, in truth, most of that time was spent making pies—thousands and thousands and thousands of pies.
In theory, this should have turned my home kitchen into Pie Heaven. A place where I would whip up one or four pies on a whim. (Friend’s birthday? Pie. The Bachelorette is on? Pie. It's a Tuesday? Pie.) In actuality, baking pies for work made baking pies in real life feel like work, and convinced me that my favorite way to show off seasonal fruit isn’t pie at all.
It’s crisp. Which brings us to a quick detour on terminology: While cobblers (baked fruit with a cakey or biscuity topping), pandowdys (baked fruit with a cut-up pastry topping), and buckles (cake with as much fruit as possible), know what they are, crisps and crumbles are in an identity crisis. Both start with fresh fruit, which gets tossed with this and that, then gets baked in a dish with a streusel on top. The catch is: Does the streusel contain oats? And, if it does contain oats, does that make it a crisp or a crumble? The answer depends on who you ask. But if you’re asking me, oats make a crisp.
Especially when it comes to this crisp where the oats are crispy.
Often, a Big Little Recipe is all about eliminating unnecessary ingredients. Say, ditching the Worcestershire in Caesar dressing because there's already anchovies and lemon. Or skipping egg whites and heavy cream in chocolate–peanut butter mousse because water works just as well. In this case, we’re keeping the classic fruit crisp ingredient list—but we’re making one ingredient work a lot harder.
If you’ve ever baked with nuts, you’ve probably been told to toast them beforehand. This extra step requires little effort (throw them on a sheet pan, slide it into a hot oven), but yields big, toasty, roasty, complex flavor. And the same is true with oats.
Twelve minutes in a 350°F oven takes oats from milky and soft-spoken to caramely and bold. Their flavor reminds me of roasted almonds or toast or roasted almond butter on toast. This simple upgrade is all it takes to make an otherwise everyday fruit crisp stand out.
In this recipe, I call for plums, but the template works well for any fruit. Try peaches or nectarines or apricots. Or swap in some berries. The fruit’s sweetness and juiciness will tell you exactly how much sugar to add (more for firmer fruit, less for riper fruit)—and the opposite goes for the flour (less for firmer fruit, more for riper fruit).
If you’re a planner, you can toast the oats in advance, and keep them in an airtight container in the pantry, for fruit crisp on a whim. Like when it’s a friend’s birthday, or The Bachelorette is on, or it's a Tuesday.
| 1 | cup rolled oats |
| 1 1/2 | cups all-purpose flour |
| 3/4 | cup light brown sugar |
| 1 | teaspoon kosher salt |
| 3/4 | cup (1 ½ sticks) unsalted butter, cubed, at a cool-ish room temperature, plus more for greasing the pan |
| 1 | cup rolled oats |
| 1 1/2 | cups all-purpose flour |
| 3/4 | cup light brown sugar |
| 1 | teaspoon kosher salt |
| 3/4 | cup (1 ½ sticks) unsalted butter, cubed, at a cool-ish room temperature, plus more for greasing the pan |
| 3 | pounds plums |
| 2/3 | cup light brown sugar, plus more as needed depending on the plums’ sweetness |
| 1/4 | teaspoon kosher salt |
| 1/4 | teaspoon freshly ground black pepper |
| 1 | tablespoon cold water |
| 5 | tablespoons all-purpose flour, plus more as needed depending on the plums’ juiciness |
| 3 | pounds plums |
| 2/3 | cup light brown sugar, plus more as needed depending on the plums’ sweetness |
| 1/4 | teaspoon kosher salt |
| 1/4 | teaspoon freshly ground black pepper |
| 1 | tablespoon cold water |
| 5 | tablespoons all-purpose flour, plus more as needed depending on the plums’ juiciness |
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Written by: Emma Laperruque
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17 Comments
I make a slightly more primitive version.
Firstly for inexperienced cooks, this recipe doesnt mention peeling the fruit, scald briefly in boiling water for the peel to slip off..especially plums, this reduces maceration of the flesh & helps preserve the juices.
For the crisp I often mix half ' old fashioned' oats with the ' 1 minute' version .. the grain is slightly less broken/ processed and gives texture.
I use alot less flour! about 3/4 cup to one cup of oats. Same for butter, 1 stick for cup of oats. ( if using more butter i guess you would need more flour to soak it up) I prefer light brown sugar but raw sugar also will work and makes a crispier topping.
Line baker with butter and add nothing to fruit. Simply toss into the baking dish add topping and bake! ( Stone fruits really need no added sugar, caveat rhubarb or gooseberries benefit from being tossed with a bit of raw sugar. And a bit of flour w cornstarch helps if the plums are very ripe /watery. )
Less sugar helps the flavors of the fruits stand out and contrasts well with the sweetened & browned oats and a creamy topping like creme fraiche, whipped or iced cream.
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