Pear-Apple Crumble with Gluten-Free Oat-Quinoa-Pecan Topping

adapted from http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/04/health/nutrition/04recipehealth.html
and http://www.martha-rose-shulman.com/recipes/stone_crum.html

Ingredients

• 3 pears, peeled, cored, and sliced thinly
• 3 apples, peeled, cored, quartered, and sliced thinly
• 1-2 Tbls. lemon juice
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 1-2 tsp. corn starch
• 1-2 Tbls. candied ginger, minced
• 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp. nutmeg

Topping ingredients

• 1-1/4 cup gluten-free rolled oats (actually, I used just regular old-fashioned oats.  However, if you are making this dish for someone with Celiac disease, you should use certified gluten-free oats, available from Bob’s Red Mill and other companies.  Conventional oats are often cross-contaminated during packaging and transportation by small amounts of flour.)
• 1/2 cup quinoa flour (grind quinoa in a spice mill or coffee grinder to make the flour)
• 1/3 cup pecans
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp. nutmeg
• 1/8 to 1/4 tsp. salt (to taste)
• 6 Tbls. cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 375°F.  Butter a 10″ pie pan or 2 to 2-1/2 quart baking dish.
2. In a large bowl, mix together pears, apples, and lemon juice.  Stir gently.  Add 1/3 c. brown sugar, corn starch, ginger, cinnamon, and 1/4 tsp. nutmeg. Let sit while you make the crumble topping
3. Make the topping: Place oats, quinoa, 1/3 c. brown sugar, and 1/4 tsp. nutmeg in the bowl of a food processor.  Pulse together.  Add butter.  Pulse until crumbly.  Add pecans.  Pulse until combined.
4. Turn the fruit mixture into the buttered pie pan.  Spoon the crumble topping over the fruit in an even layer.  Bake until bubbly and browned, 50-60 minutes.  (Check often in the last 20 minutes of baking to make certain the topping is not burning.)

Notes

If you prefer a more coarse topping, either combine the topping ingredients in a bowl using your hands, or reserve 1/2 cup of the oats and at least half of the pecans, mix the other ingredients in the food processor, turn out into a bowl, and then mix in the reserved oats and pecans by hand.

The New York Times recipes required baking the topping and fruit mixtures separately and then combining them.  I couldn’t be bothered with that, but you might want to try it.

I bake all pies/crisps/crumbles by placing the pie pan on a foil-lined baking sheet to guard my oven from spills and drips (thus the foil seen in the photo).

Enjoy!
Copyright © 2010, Lucinda DeWitt