Jam Crumble Fingers

Jam Crumble Fingers

Nostalgia in food is worth celebrating; after all, how else can you literally feed your children your own childhood memories? For Proust it may have been a macaroon, but for me, memory is evoked by the joy of jam crumble fingers. Hence, my daughter's recent birthday party celebration simply had to include some of these, neatly cut into small, bite-sized squares. However, for an upcoming adult tea, I'm going to present them straight out of the oven, with the jam still bubbling and the pastry hot and crisp and note how long it will take the adults to revert to being children again, that is, whether they will wait until the jam is cool enough to eat without ill effects. Remember, sugar boils at an extremely high temperature and can cause terrible burns, so do be careful.

This pastry uses no rising agent, it does not need baking powder; in fact, that is one of the best things about it - any decorative effects remain WYSIWYG - that is, W(hat) Y(ou) S(ee) I(s) W(hat) Y(ou) G(et), which is wonderful not only because you do not have to worry about the baking powder taste, but also because, should you, for instance, wish instead to use this pastry mixture to make individual jam tarts, and decorate these with something like a star or heart shape on top, you will not incur the risk of having a voluminous heart overlapping the sides of your tart in an unseemly and overblown manner, but in a discrete and elegant manner, it will remain substantially the size and shape you first placed on the jam. 

The secret to any pastry is two-fold: extreme cold in the mixing and extreme heat in the baking thereof. Do bear in mind that all recipes mention you should pre-heat your oven for a reason. This pastry cooks at a slightly lower temperature than usual since a burnt jam flavour is not entirely recommended.

When working with pastry, work both deftly and quickly, with cold utensils and cold ingredients - I even often pop the mixture into the freezer to cool it for a few minutes to retain the correct temperature, which relates greatly to the ease with which you can work with the pastry, particularly when it comes to the grating part. The methodology is the same as in the chicken pies, cold butter, grated into cold flour, preferably straight from the freezer, and I do also place the final mixture in the fridge for a few minutes before I start working with it.

Jam Crumble Finger Recipe

375 grams flour (3 cups)

225 grams butter (½ pound)

145 grams granulated or ordinary sugar (¾ cup)

1 teaspoon vanilla essence (or more)

1 large egg

Jam - apricot is an eternal favourite. At least half a tin/bottle (between 100 and 200 grams)

Pre-heat oven to 'moderate', which is 180 ºC, 350 ºF, gas mark 4

Beat together the egg and sugar, then add the vanilla essence for taste. In a separate bowl, with the tips of your fingers only, rub chilled, grated butter into the flour until well mixed and resembling a sandy porridge. I usually pulse it a few times in my mixer to ensure it is cool and crumbly to the touch. 

Next, mix together the liquid and dry ingredients, possibly using a cold fork for the purpose and working deftly since you need to keep all pastries - even a crumble such as this - chilled rather than warm, for the best effect. Place in fridge for a while to allow the flour cells to burst and the pastry to remain cool and easily workable.

Take roughly one-third of the mixture, and set it aside. Roll out the remainder, and place into the bottom of a lined, oblong tin. Take jam and smear evenly across this surface, leaving about 1cm (⅓ inch) around the edges. I have found that slightly warming the jam in the microwave makes the jam more spreadable, but it must still be cool lest it start softening the pastry, i.e., melting the butter, which would be contra-indicated in terms of the final result. Next, take the final third of the mixture and grate it through the coarsest setting over the jam, ensuring a relatively even distribution over the top, again making sure the jam near the sides is covered; I have eaten overcooked, burnt jam crumbles before and it was not an experience I long to repeat.

The Women's Institute book from which I have adapted the recipe said, "bake until brown on top". It appears to be about 30-45 minutes, depending on how thick you make your base and top. What I did notice, apart from the delicious smells that start wafting through the kitchen, thereby alerting you to the fact that the baking is done, is that when the jam starts bubbling away through the myriad little holes in the crumble, you simply know it is done.

Wait for it to cool down on a wire rack before cutting into the fingers or squares required. Or serve, suitably hot, and watch what transpires.