Super Crispy Fruit Crisp

The thing I love most about cooking is improvising. Although I own 89+ cookbooks, I rarely follow a recipe. The fun, for me, is in 'winging it.' Doing my own thing.

Baking isn't usually as much fun. You've got to stick to the recipe or you risk ruining your cake. What fun is that? 

That's what I love about this recipe. Although you do need to follow the basic formula, this recipe just invites improvising! My current favorite combination of fruit is 2 granny smith apples, 2 pears, and 1 cup each of blueberries and cherries. But that'll change as the seasons do. When stone fruit is in season, I can't get enough of fresh peach and blueberry crisp. 

Super Crispy Fruit Crisp This is a basic formula which you can use with lots of different combinations of fruits. I mostly use fresh seasonal fruit but I've also had really good results with frozen cranberries,cherries, and blueberries. My favorite combinations: 

• pears, apples, and cranberries
• pears, apples, blueberries, and cherries
• peaches, nectarines, and blueberries
• apples (granny smith or any other firm favorites) and dried cherries
• strawberries, rhubarb, and apples 
• plums and apples
• peaches, apples, and cherries

FRUIT
about 6 cups of your favorite fruit, pitted, peeled and sliced as necessary
2 tablespoons whole wheat flour
juice of half a lemon
1-2 tablespoons sugar, optional, if the fruit is tart or if you like a sweeter crisp

TOPPING
½ cup coconut oil
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup old fashioned oatmeal
½ cup pecans, broken into small but not tiny pieces

Preheat the oven to 350*.

Combine the prepared fruit, lemon juice, flour and salt in a Pyrex pie plate. Mix well. (Here's my favorite on Amazon.)

In a very large mixing bowl, combine the coconut oil, brown sugar, oatmeal, and nuts. Crumble the mixture with your fingers to make a coarse crumb. (This is my favorite part. I love how the grainy sugar feels against my hands.)

Scatter the topping evenly over the fruit. Bake for about an hour, till the top is beginning to brown.

Serve warm or cool completely before covering with foil and refrigerating for up to three days. If you are refrigerating it, bring it back to room temperature before serving.

Linking this up to Melt in your Mouth Monday and Ultimate Recipe Swap.