Hedgerow Crumble with Einkorn, Hazelnuts and Spiced Custard

 This is a proper dark-autumn pudding: sharp apples and hedgerow berries beneath a rough, buttery topping made with nutty einkorn flour and toasted hazelnuts. A gently infused ginger-and-cinnamon custard makes it especially good for Samhain, Halloween or the first cold evenings of the year.

Ingredients

For the fruit
600 g Bramley apples, peeled, cored and cut into 2 cm pieces
250 g blackberries, fresh or frozen
100 g fully ripe elderberries, carefully removed from all stalks, fresh or frozen
70 g light brown sugar
1 tablespoon cornflour
Finely grated zest and 1 tablespoon juice from ½ unwaxed lemon

For the crumble
180 g wholemeal einkorn flour
100 g cold unsalted butter, diced
70 g light muscovado or demerara sugar
60 g toasted hazelnuts, roughly chopped
40 g rolled oats
A pinch of fine sea salt

For the ginger-and-cinnamon custard
500 ml whole milk
15 g fresh ginger, thinly sliced
1 small cinnamon stick
4 large egg yolks
50 g caster sugar
20 g cornflour
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
A small pinch of salt

Method

Heat the oven to 190°C/170°C fan/gas 5. Use a roughly 2-litre ovenproof dish.

Put the apples, blackberries and carefully prepared elderberries into the dish. Mix the sugar with the cornflour, then toss it through the fruit with the lemon zest and juice. Spread the filling evenly.

For the topping, place the einkorn flour and salt in a bowl. Rub in the cold butter until the mixture resembles uneven breadcrumbs, leaving a few larger pieces for texture. Stir in the sugar, hazelnuts and oats. Scatter the crumble loosely over the fruit without pressing it down.

Bake for 40–45 minutes, until the topping is golden and the fruit is bubbling vigorously around the edges. If the topping colours too quickly, cover it loosely with foil for the final 10 minutes. Rest for 10 minutes before serving.

While the crumble bakes, make the custard. Put the milk, ginger and cinnamon stick in a saucepan. Bring just to steaming, remove from the heat, cover and infuse for 10 minutes. Strain, return the milk to the pan and warm it again.

Whisk the egg yolks, sugar, cornflour, vanilla and salt in a heatproof bowl until smooth. Gradually whisk in the hot milk. Return everything to the saucepan and cook over a low-to-medium heat, stirring continuously, until the custard is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. Let it give one or two gentle bubbles to cook the cornflour, then immediately remove it from the heat. Serve warm with the rested crumble.

Storage

Keep the cooled crumble covered in the refrigerator for up to 3 days and reheat until piping hot. Refrigerate the custard separately within 2 hours, use within 2 days and reheat gently while stirring; do not boil it.

Foraging & Safety Notes

Use only correctly identified, fully ripe black elderberries from European elder (Sambucus nigra). Remove every piece of stalk, leaf and unripe fruit; elderberries must be thoroughly cooked and should not be eaten raw. Gather berries away from busy roads and sprayed land and wash before use. Hazelnuts are a tree nut allergen. Einkorn contains gluten and is not suitable for people with coeliac disease. The custard contains egg and milk.