The salty kind

Crumbles have always been among my favorite desserts: just writing their name "crumble" conjures up apple vanilla wafts, ruby red rhubarb acidity contrasted by that rubbly mixture turned all nicely golden on top after being conveyed to the oven.

Having tried and happily tested dozens of them, it was time I went and explored the other side of the shore, where the salty kind of crumbles reside. The recipe available here - one of my favorite food blogs ever, but if you are a regular here, you know that already - offered the option of baking a cherry tomato crumble. The blog's author being based in the French Franche-Comté area (have you seen her pics of the place?), the comté cheese is one of the stars of the recipe.

Needless to say that the summery look and feel of the recipe caught my taste immediately, but as always, I also followed my own (largely fridge dictated) instinct and tweaked with the ingredients a little...just a little though as you will see below:

INGREDIENTS

-About 30 cherry tomatoes

-One courgette (this is the odd man out, found all alone whining in the fresh produce compartment at the bottom of the fridge)

-A nice bunch of basil leaves (some day, someone will have to explain to me why, why on earth we get our basil supplies all the way from...Israel, while there is great tasting basil available all over southern Europe...)

-Sea salt (Maldon, if available)

-Black pepper

-Olive oil

FOR THE CRUMBLE TOPPING:

-80 gr plain flour

-50 gr grated comté cheese

-Sea salt (Maldon, if available, again)

-Black pepper

-Olive oil

HOW TO:

-Set the oven at 180° C

-Wash the veggies

-Cut the cherry tomatoes in half

-Slife the courgette as thinly as possible

-In a bowl, mix the tomatoes, courgette, sea salt, pepper, shredded basil leaves and a couple tbsp olive oil and set aside

-Prepare the topping: mix the floud and grated comté delicately, add salt and pepper and about 2 tbsp olive oil. The original recipe calls for 4 tbsp, but it seemed an awful lot to me, so I reduced the quantity. In the end, judge with your fingers, while rubbing the mixture to make the famous "crumbles", it should look like wet sand. If need be, you can of course add olive oil to taste.

-Place the veggie mixture in an oven-proof ramequin (or split it between small ramequins), top with the crumble topping.

-Place in the over for about 30 minutes, but keep an eye on it: the top should be just golden, not brown.

Serve warm, though be careful when dipping in: it can be terribly hot at the bottom! Enjoy with wiggling toes and sparkling eyes while dreaming of olive trees all around you.

Credit: Flickr