Food Porn: Toffee Apple Crumble Squares

Sometimes I dream about food. And sometimes I dream-create recipes. 

That might make me sound a bit crazy. Actually there's no 'might' about it... But sometimes when I dream-create recipes I come up with some epic ideas, just like this one. 

The morning after the Toffee Apple Crumble Squares dream I looked on the internet to see if there were any similar recipes doing the rounds, and there were some fruity crumble traybake ones but none like this. All of those recipes used a sponge base, whereas I knew that I wanted to create a crunch-squidge-crunch texture so it just had to be shortbread. And none of those recipes incorporated the squidgy, sugary delight that is toffee, preferring to use a fruit jam or compote. Well that's just not the way I roll. 

So here's the recipe. You can thank my subconscious later. 

Ingredients to make one batch in a 20cm square tin: 

For the shortbread base... 

175g of unsalted butter, cut into cubes

225g of plain flour (substitute for GF plain flour if required) 

75g of golden caster sugar 

For the crumble topping... 

165g of plain flour (substitute for GF plain flour if required) 

105g of unsalted butter, cut into cubes

45g of soft light brown sugar 

For the squidgy filling... 

150g of unsalted butter

1 397g can of condensed milk

150g of soft light brown sugar

2 cooking apples, peeled and cut into small chunks 

First preheat the oven to 180c/160c fan and then line the tin with greaseproof paper or buttered foil, leaving an inch of the paper sticking up around the edge of the tin to make it easy to lift out the traybake when it's done. 

In a food processor (or by rubbing in with your fingertips) pulse all the ingredients for the shortbread until they resemble course breadcrumbs. This is exactly the same method I used in my Salted Caramel Millionaire's Shortbread recipe! Tip the dough into the tin and press down evenly into the bottom until flat, then use a fork to prick the surface of the dough all over. Put the tin into the oven and bake for 5 minutes at 180c/160c fan, then turn the oven down to 150c/130c fan and cook for 35 minutes. When done remove from the oven and set aside to cool. 

For the toffee filling melt together the butter, condensed milk, and sugar in a medium saucepan and then bring to the boil for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally to prevent the mixture from burning. While this is boiling, gently fry the apple chunks in a frying pan with a knob of butter for a couple of minutes until the apple is softened and slightly coloured. Then pour the toffee onto the shortbread base, making sure the base is evenly covered, and spread the apple chunks over the toffee. 

For the crumble topping pulse all the ingredients in a food processor (or again rub in with your fingertips) until the mixture resembles course breadcrumbs, similar to the shortbread. Then sprinkle the crumble over the apples and toffee, taking care not to break up the crumbs. Make sure that all the toffee is covered by the crumble, otherwise the toffee is liable to burn whilst in the oven! Then place the tray back in the oven at 200c/180c fan for 25-30 minutes or until the crumble is golden. 

When done remove from the oven and leave to cool in the tray. When cooled remove from the tray, cut into squares and devour! The squares will be crunchy and squidgy, and there'll be the sweetness of the toffee with the sharp tang of apple.