Single Serving Apple Crisp

I made these for Lexxa's teachers for Teacher Appreciation week.

I decided to go with a picnic-y springtime theme for these.  (it helped that the decorations were on sale at Michael's.)  All you really need for the jars is canning jars, some fabric (the fabric i used was some scrap fabric I had in my fabric bin) and any decorations you want for the outside of the lid.  I chose some flower appliques and ribbon.  A glue gun works best to keep everything in it's place!

And for the internal workings of the apple crisp itself, you will need:

 For the gooey goodness:

4 short, half-pint glass canning jars*
3 1/2 cups (7-10 whole) apples, peeled and thinly sliced
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/2 cup white sugar
2 Tbsp brown sugar

2 Tbsp all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg

The apples should be washed peeled and chopped into thin chunks. Toss with the lemon juice.

Then mix the other ingredients in a small bowl.

The next step is mixing it all together!

 

When I did this project I used 3 jars and filled them 2/3 of the way full and had plenty of extra to make a regular apple crisp for the house.  If I was to do it again, I would fill them almost all the way full, as they cook down quite a bit!

 

This is what was left over... plenty to fill the jars up all the way and still have enough for a 4th jar if needed!

 

 For the topping you will need: 
1/4 cup brown sugar 
1/4 cup all-purpose flour 
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon 
2 tablespoons oats 
3 tablespoons cold butter

Mix the flower, sugar and cinnamon in a large bowl.  Cut in the cold butter.  Once it is well integrated, stir in the oats.

 

This is a handy little thing used to cut cold butter into a recipe.  You use it much like a potato masher but rock it side to side to integrate the butter.  If you don't have one you can literally cut the butter in with two knives using a cutting motion away from each other.

Then sprinkle the topping on top of the apple mixture in the jars.  I made my topping layer about 1 inch deep.

 

Notice how I didn't say anything about preheating your oven.  That is because you will actually preheat the oven with the jars inside so the glass doesn't heat too quickly.  Use a cookie sheet in case of overspill.

Set oven to 375 and let bake for 45-60 minutes.  You want the topping to be nice and brown and bubbly!

 

Now for the decorating!  I used my lids as guides.  I used about an inch-and-a-half over the size of the lid.  If mine had been sharp, I would have used pinking shears... oh well!

The nice thing about the canning jars is the lids come apart so they are very easy to decorate!

 

I put hot glue on the inserts to hold down the fabric.

 

 Then you can decorate the rim of the lid however you would like!  I used ribbon and some fun fabric flowers!

Hot glue worked best to hold down the ribbon and the flowers.

Once the crisps are cooled completely you can put them all together.  As you can see here, I made little cards from some festive paper I had.  I just punched a hole in the corner of the card and looped a piece of thin ribbon through the hole and around the lid rim.

See how much the cooked down!  Definitely going to fill them up all the way next time!

 

I didn't have Lex help me with this one because she wasn't with me that week, but this is something she would have loved helping out with!  Hope you all enjoy this project as much as I did!  AND it was a hit with the teachers too!