For all the years that I’ve been baking, I’m still not sure I know the difference between a crisp and a crumble. Both have fruit and a crumb topping. I’ve read that a crumble has oats and a crisp doesn’t, and I’ve read that both have oats, and that neither does.
In Paris, where I live part time, you rarely see a crisp on a menu. But le crumble (sometimes with oats and often without) is tres trendy. So what’s a cook to do? I say, just bake and enjoy! That’s what I do year-round, swapping the fruit as the seasons’ bounty rolls in and out.
Although my recipe files are crammed with crisp toppings — I’m going with crisp until someone tells me I can’t — my current go-to is the accompanying mix of classic streusel and oats. (Sometimes I scratch the oats, but not if my husband’s around. He loves the flavor and extra chew you get from rolled oats.) It’s a blend of brown and white sugars, flour and oats, vanilla, spices (your choice) and butter — cold bits that you squeeze and rub and pinch into the dry ingredients until you get a lumpy, bumpy bunch of crumbs. The important test here is the grab-and-press: when you can grab a handful of topping, press it and have it hold together in your fist, you’re there. Give it a chill and then make a decision: To crisp your crisp or not.
When you chill the topping, strew it over the fruit and bake, you’ll get a classic crisp. The very top of the topping will be crisp, and the rest will be slightly soft, slightly chewy and completely scrumptious. But when you bake half of the topping on its own before constructing the crisp, you’ll have a mix of crunchy and soft, of chewy and crackly. Each spoonful will be different. As the sports guys say: This’ll take it to the next level.