My grandmothers were amazing women, and I'm proud to be part of their legacies. They were also amazing cooks, and I have in my repetoire not a few of their recipes that I remember fondly from my childhood and try to repeat as often as possible.

Chief among these is my paternal grandmother's recipe for "crumbs" which originally adorned her crumb cake (which I don't bake enough...hmm...) and which are used in my family most often as topping for fruit crisps (primarily apple, though I prefer peach or mixed berry). I have to say, for a recipe so simple it's criminal, these crumbs are - I think - better than any fancier crisp or crumble or betty or whatever topping that I've ever had. (In fact, a friend of mine who was in cooking school a while ago brought this recipe into her class to do a taste test and it won over a myriad of other interpretations.)

So tonight, as I'm trying to clean the refrigerator of all perishables before we leave for a weekend in San Diego, I notice a pint of beautiful blackberries that will definitely go to waste if we don't eat them now. I pull out my food processor and mix together a stick of butter, 1/2 cup sugar, 1 cup flour, and a few shakes of cinnamon until it's clumpy (that's a technical term, folks). I toss the blackberries with a bit of flour and some lemon zest, dump them into a baking dish, and dump about half the crumbs on top (the rest go in the freezer for next time). After dinner, I'll stick it in the oven for 25 minutes or so let it go golden and melty and brown, and then we'll enjoy a dessert that's decidedly more decadent than the recipe suggests.

Thanks Nana!