Last Updated on August 20, 2021 by Chenée Lewis
I just love strawberry season! It’s so exciting to see all the juicy, ripe strawberries that are in such abundance in the spring and summer. And there isn’t a better way to showcase those fresh berries than this easy strawberry crumble! It’s a rich, egg-free dessert bursting with a sweetened ripe strawberry filling topped with a lightly spiced oat crumb topping that is so incredible! It’s just begging to be paired with some vanilla ice cream for the ideal summer treat!
What to do with lots of ripe strawberries?
This strawberry crumble recipe is the best way to use your baskets and baskets of fresh, super-sweet strawberries from picking or your local farmer’s markets! It uses a pound and a half of strawberries, so they definitely won’t go to waste! Plus, this recipe only uses a few ingredients in addition to the strawberries, so it’s super simple to make! Your whole family will ask for it again and again!
Ingredients
- old-fashioned oats – I love the texture that oats brings to this buttery strawberry crumble topping! I prefer old-fashioned oats, but if you have quick oats that would work too.
- all-purpose flour – make you’re you’re measuring your flour correctly. I like to use a kitchen scale to measure in grams.
- salted butter – your butter should be cubed and very cold. I like to cut it into cubes and then pop it back in the freezer for 10 minutes to get it cold again. You can definitely use unsalted butter if you prefer — just add in 1/4 tsp of salt before mixing up your crumble topping.
- light brown sugar – adding brown sugar adds such a rich sweetness and goes so well with the oats and touch of cinnamon in our crumb topping.
- ground cinnamon – you can definitely omit the cinnamon if you prefer, but I love the hint of spice it adds to this strawberry crumble.
- strawberries – you’ll need about 4½ cups of strawberries, which is about 1½ pounds if you’re using fresh ones. If you do use frozen strawberries, I recommend thawing them and draining any excess liquid before adding them to this strawberry crumble, to keep your filling from being too liquidy.
- granulated sugar – We’ll add our sugar in to bring out the natural sweetness in our strawberries. If you’ve got very sweet ripe strawberries, feel free to cut down on the sugar a bit.
- lemon juice – just a little lemon juice adds a bit of tartness and balances out the sweetness in our filling.
- cornstarch – we’ll add cornstarch to thicken up our filling as it bakes.
- vanilla extract – I like the flavor of vanilla in pretty much everything, but here I find that it adds a bit of warmth to our strawberry crumble filling that complements the oat topping so well!
- vanilla ice cream – the perfect accompaniment to this summery strawberry crumble!
Equipment
To make your strawberry crumble you’ll only need one key tool – a pastry blender! I love how easy it is to use my pastry blender to cut butter into this oat topping while keeping the butter nice and cold. But honestly, if you don’t have a pastry blender, a fork or even your hands will work fine! Other than that, you’ll just need a deep-dish pie pan or 9×9 baking pan to bake up your strawberry crumble, and you’re ready to go!
Tips and F.A.Q.
For this strawberry crumble, I love this trick I learned from The Kitchn — just mix the strawberries and sugar together and let them sit for up to an hour to release some of the strawberries’ juices. Then just drain some of the juice, leaving 2 tablespoons to include in the recipe. Finally, toss the strawberries with the rest of the filling ingredients and top with the crumble topping!
This strawberry crumble will be done when the oat crumble topping is a nice golden brown, and the strawberry filling is bubbling. It should be done in about 35 minutes, but I would begin checking it after 30 minutes.
Absolutely! Just be sure to thaw and drain them before adding them to the recipe.
Sure! This recipe would be great with blueberries, blackberries, or peaches — the bake time may vary a bit, so just keep an eye on it!
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Strawberry Crumble
Print Pin Recipe Rate RecipeEquipment you may need
- deep-dish pie pan
- 8×8 baking dish
- pastry blender
Ingredients
- ⅔ cup (54 g) old fashioned oats
- 1 ¼ cup (156 g) all-purpose flour
- 1 cup (220 g) light brown sugar
- ¾ tsp (2 g) cinnamon - optional
- 10 tbsp (140 g) cold salted butter - diced into small cubes
- 1½ lb (680 g) strawberries
- 1 tbsp (15 ml) lemon juice
- 1 tsp (5 ml) pure vanilla extract
- ⅓ cup (50 g) granulated sugar
- 2 tbsp (2 tbsp) cornstarch
- vanilla ice cream - for serving (optional, but not really optional)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375°F/180°C and spray a deep-dish pie pan or 9×9 baking pan with cooking spray.
Crumble Topping
- In a medium bowl, mix together oats, flour, brown sugar, and cinnamon (if using).⅔ cup old fashioned oats, 1 cup light brown sugar, ¾ tsp cinnamon, 1 ¼ cup all-purpose flour
- Add cold butter cubes and cut butter into dry ingredients using a pastry blender, fork, or your fingers until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Place in fridge to stay cool while you make your filling.10 tbsp cold salted butter
Strawberry Filling
- In a bowl, stir together strawberries, lemon juice, vanilla, and sugar. Let sit at room temperature for 30 minutes to bring out strawberry juices.1½ lb strawberries, 1 tbsp lemon juice, 1 tsp pure vanilla extract, ⅓ cup granulated sugar
- Remove all but 2 tbsp of juices, then stir in cornstarch.2 tbsp cornstarch
- Pour strawberry mixture into prepared pan and top with crumble mixture.
- Bake in preheated oven for 35 min or until crumb topping is golden brown and the strawberry filling is bubbling.
- Serve warm with vanilla ice cream.vanilla ice cream
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This is absolutely the perfect dessert for summer! We were looking for a seasonal dessert to serve at our last BBQ, and this was a hit. Everyone loved it with ice cream too.
Oh yes the ice cream makes it so perfect!
This strawberry crumble had me droooling! The sweetness from the strawberries and crunchiness from the crumble paired together perfectly.
Yes I love that texture contrast!
I loved this take on a crumble! I’ve had peach, blueberry, and apple crumbles but never a strawberry crumble so this was genius and absolutely delicious!!
Thank you! I love crumbles too AND I love strawberries so it was a natural conclusion!
Strawberries were so ripe at my grocery store last weekend that I bought way too many. This crumble was a great way to use some of them and it was delicious! So easy, too! Thank you!
Awesome! So glad it worked out for you!
This strawberry crumble is so delicious! I used gluten-free all-purpose flour instead of regular flour and it came out perfect!
Wonderful! Glad the gluten-free swap worked well!
I love baking with in season strawberries. Your recipe was excellent! Sweet & crunchy in every bite. We topped with some vanilla custard!
Sounds like a great idea for topping!
I needed a quick dessert so I tried this recipe and the result was superb!
Wonderful! I love how easy it is.
I do love and always have a carton of strawberries in the fridge. This recipe steps were really easy to follow and the crumble came out absolutely perfect!
So glad you liked it! Thanks!