Staring at a a heap of untouched green apples at work I started to contemplate what to make with them. Now a crumble would be an obvious thing but the idea of taking an apple crumble to work for people to share seems a little odd to say the least. So what could I do with them? I've been developing a recipe for an apple cake, so that was already out of the equation, and a loaf cake wouldn't be so much different, so why not a biscuit or a cookie? Looking back to my recipe for Cerealously Crunchy Cookies I started to wonder if you could turn an apple crumble into a cookie. Well, it turns out you can.
Makes 16
Hands-on Time 25 minutes plus chilling (overnight)
Baking Time 38 minutes
Ingredients
530g Plain flour
230g Rolled oats
240g Caster sugar
4 1/2 tsp Ground cinnamon
1 tsp plus a pinch Fine salt
65g Unsalted butter (chilled) & 250g (softened)
200g Light brown sugar
2 tsp Vanilla extract
2 Eggs, large
1 tsp Bicarbonate of soda
5-6 small Green apples
Equipment
Large mixing bowl
Knife
Baking sheet (ideally aluminium)
Baking parchment
Fork
Freestanding mixer with paddle
Spatula
Clingfilm
Wire rack
Preheat the oven to 180°C/160°C (Fan)/350°F/Gas mark 4.
In a large mixing bowl add 130 grams of flour, 30 grams of oats, 65 grams of caster sugar, 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon, and a pinch of salt and combine using your hand.
Cube 65 grams of chilled butter and place the pieces on top of the dry mix.
Using the tips of your thumbs and fingers rub the butter and dry mix together until you have a crumb. I find it’s best to roll the cubes of butter in the dry mix to coat them and then squeezing between my fingers until they’re flat before doing any rubbing.
Line a baking sheet with parchment and tip the crumble over it. Try to make sure it’s as evenly spread out as possible.
Pop the sheet into the oven for 20-25 minutes, stirring halfway with a fork to ensure you get an even bake.
When you have a golden crumble remove the sheet from the oven and set aside to cool.
When you’re ready to make the cookies add 250 grams of softened butter, 175 grams of caster sugar, and the light brown sugar to the bowl of the mixer and beat on a medium-high speed for 5 minutes until you have a very light and fluffy mixture.
Add the vanilla and eggs and beat for a couple of seconds until combined.
Add the 400 grams of flour, bicarb, 4 teaspoons of cinnamon, and 1 teaspoon of salt, and again beat for a couple of seconds until combined. Scrape the sides down using a spatula to make sure everything is incorporated.
Peel, halve, and remove the cores from the apples. Dice the apple halves up into small pieces.
Add the diced apple along with the remaining 200 grams of oats to the cookie mixture and mix one last time. You shouldn’t need to run the mixer for more than half a minute or so. The key thing is not to over-mix.
Take a sheet of baking parchment and place the dough onto. Shape the dough into a wide, long sausage and roll up before popping it into fridge to chill for 30 minutes.
Line a baking sheet with parchment.
Take the crumble you made earlier, break it up using your hands if it has formed clumps.
Remove the bowl and take a portion of the dough and roll into a ball.
Put the ball onto the crumble and roll to completely coat it.
Place the ball onto the baking sheet and repeat until you have used up all of the dough, you are aiming to have 16. At this point if you want to bake the cookies at a later time you could put the dough balls, with the parchment, into a Tupperware box and freeze. Otherwise, cover the dough balls with clingfilm and leave in the fridge to get really firm, ideally overnight.
Preheat the oven to 170°C/150°C (Fan)/325°F/Gas mark 3.
Slide the baking sheet out of the fridge and leave the dough balls on the shelf.
Once the oven has warmed up line the baking sheet with another piece of parchment.
Place approx 6/8 balls spaced about 10cm apart from each other onto the baking parchment.
Pop the tray into the oven on a middle shelf for 18 minutes.
When the time is up the cookies should be gloriously golden.
Remove the tray from the oven. Slide the parchment carefully, with the cookies, onto the worktop. Re-line with more paper and bake your next batch.
After the cookies have rested for a couple of minutes they should be firm enough for you to transfer onto a wire rack to fully cool. Don’t forget they will get firmer as they cool, as tempting as it is to immediately eat them straight from the oven. Like some things in life, patience pays off.
Enjoy!
