Black Forest Crumble Recipe

This Black Forest crumble recipe combines all my favourite components of the two desserts: the chocolate sponge, cherries and cream of a Black Forest gateau, and the comforting stewed fruits and buttery, crunchy topping of a crumble.

Sure, you can bake this Black Forest crumble without the chocolate sponge base. But to me, it isn't Black Forest without the chocolate sponge – it has to have that, the cherries, AND the cream. And a little kirsch for purists (although I use brandy if I don't happen to have any floating around).

The booze is totally optional for this particular recipe, though.

To make the stewed fruit part, I use a combination of ready-made canned cherry pie filling and frozen cherries. The canned pie filling is more convenient and speedy than making your own from scratch, yes, but I also happen to quite like the canned stuff.

The frozen cherries (you can use fresh, if they're in season – just remember to remove the pits) provide a bit of extra texture to the crumble, as the fruit in the premade filling will already be quite mushy.

Placing the frozen cherries directly on the sponge base will make sure that the sponge soaks up some of the moisture seeping out of them. You don't really have to worry about the cherry pie filling becoming too liquidy, as it's already been cooked down and thickened with starch.

As for the crumble topping, it wasn't enough for me to have a plain topping: I had to both add cocoa powder to the crumble to make it chocolatey, and add extra chopped chocolate underneath it. Very naughty.

You can also watch me make this on my YouTube channel, Tashcakes:

Ready? Let's go.

Ingredients for Chocolate Crumble Layer

160g unsalted butter, softened at room temperature
100g caster sugar
100g light muscovado sugar / light soft brown sugar
200g plain flour
60g cocoa powder, sifted
Pinch of salt

Ingredients for Chocolate Sponge Base

115g unsalted butter, softened at room temperature
115g caster sugar
2 eggs
115g self-raising flour
Pinch of salt
40g cocoa powder, sifted
50ml milk
2 tbsp kirsch or brandy (optional)

Ingredients for Fruit and Chocolate Layer

2 cans black cherry pie filling
400g frozen cherries
100g dark chocolate (at least 70% cocoa solids), roughly chopped

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C and grease a 28 x 38cm baking dish with oil, butter or baking spray.

2. First, make the crumble layer: rub all the ingredients together with your fingers in a large bowl until it forms a dry-ish dough that clumps together when lightly squeezed, like wet sand. Set aside.

3. Next, make the sponge layer: in another bowl, cream the butter and sugars together until fluffy. Beat in the eggs, followed by the flour, cocoa powder and salt, and finally the milk and brandy.

4. Spread the chocolate sponge batter in the bottom of your greased dish in an even layer.

5. Evenly dot over your frozen cherries, and then dollop over the cherry pie filling. Then sprinkle over the chopped chocolate.

6. Roughly crumble the crumb topping over the top, getting a mix of big and small chunks. Lightly press down with your hands to compress a little.

7. Bake for about 45–50 minutes, or until bubbly and a bit puffy – keep an eye on the crumble, you want it to deepen in colour but not burn.

8. Leave to cool for 15 minutes before serving with the best quality custard you can find.

Enjoy, and have fun.