Easy Homemade Vegan Apple Crisp Recipe
Gooey, soft caramelized spiced apples and a crisp oat crumble make up this ridiculously easy dump-and-bake style vegan apple crisp recipe. It’s basically like an old-fashioned, classic apple crisp- without the dairy, yet you’d NEVER know. You’re just 45 minutes away from the best classic fall comfort dessert, served warm with a scoop of (vegan) vanilla ice cream to finish!
This is a family favorite easy vegan Thanksgiving dessert recipe when you’re looking for something simpler than pie, but just as satisfying. And if you just LOVE those gooey, caramelized “apple pie” style apples, then you just need to try my vegan apple pie cinnamon rolls, which literally feel like a combination of apple pie in cinnamon roll form!
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If I were to choose one apple recipe to make this fall, it would be this: classic apple crisp, made VEGAN!
Here’s why you need to make this recipe:
- As delicious as pie, but way easier. We’re simply tossing all the ingredients together, quickly assembling in one casserole dish and baking. The result? A filling with caramelized gooey sliced apples, coated in a sweet cinnamon, and topped with a sweet and crisp oat crumble topping that just makes you swoon. But if you ARE a pie lover as well, then you won’t be disappointed by this classic vegan apple pie with caramelized apples!
- Unbelievably vegan and dairy free. I had some of my non-vegan family members even test this apple crisp recipe, and they were speechless. Like literally could not believe there was no real butter in here, and yet the apple filling was perfectly gooey and rich?! And that crumble was *crisp*!!
- No need to pre-cook the apples! Unlike apple pie, which sometimes requires you to pre-cook the apples to remove any moisture that would create a soggy pie crust bottom, this apple crisp thrives with extra moisture from the apples! That’s how we get our super gooey texture! And for another super easy apple dessert that requires ZERO pre-cooked apples, you’ll love my moist vegan apple fritter cake with cinnamon crumble.
- Simple ingredients. We’re talking apples, sugar, light brown sugar, oats, and flour. And some spices and vegan butter- that’s it!
- You can serve it immediately: No need to cool! Just scoop some vegan ice cream on top and devour!
Key Ingredients:
- Apples: Particularly the sweet variety (think Gala or Honeycrisp…Fuji works great too!). Many people say not to use Gala apples for apple pie, but I think it’s delicious in an apple crisp.
- Light brown sugar: In my testing, using light brown sugar will give us a deeper flavor than just granulated sugar (thanks to the extra molasses coating the light brown sugar!).
- Cornstarch: You can also use arrowroots starch if you cannot have corn. This will help bind our ingredients.
- All-purpose flour: For our crisp, we’re combining flour with oats. If you’re gluten-free (and can tolerate oats), I recommend using gluten-free all-purpose flour (like King Arthur Measure-for-Measure gluten-free flour). I’ve used this one in particular in testing, and it worked really well!
- Rolled oats: PLEASE make sure these are rolled oats and NOT quick oats nor steel-cut oats. Neither option will work!
- Ground cinnamon: I personally love just classic cinnamon here (instead of Ceylon cinnamon- but up to you!).
- Vegan butter: The one ingredient that could skew non-vegan if needed, but it REALLY works well as a vegan apple crisp. I make a homemade vegan butter (recipe coming soon!), but for store bought varieties, you can use Earth Balance or even just plain refined coconut oil. Just make sure it’s refined, as you don’t want the coconut flavor coming through!
How to make the best vegan apple crisp recipe:
- Toss together the apples. In a large mixing bowl or directly into the casserole dish you plan to bake in, you’ll add lemon and cinnamon, and toss until evenly coated. Then pour the sliced apples into your casserole dish.
- Make the oat crisp in a separate bowl.
- Assemble the apple crisp and bake! Then top the apple layer with the cinnamon oat crumble. Place into the oven, covered with some tin foil for the start, to bake.
- Serve & enjoy! Once baked, serve warm with vegan ice cream and enjoy!
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Once it’s done, remove it from the oven with an oven mitt and let it cool for a few minutes before topping with some vegan vanilla ice cream and diving in!
Frequently Asked Questions:
Do I need to remove the apple peels for an apple crisp?
In my experimenting, the best apple crisp comes from removing the apple peels. I know, it adds an extra 5 minutes of work. But when I tested it without removing the peels, it didn’t feel as consistently gooey and caramelized.
Like my vegan apple crumble cheesecake with gooey cinnamon apples, the apples become SO gooey because the peel is removed.
Some people don’t mind the texture with the peels, but personally, I want a really consistently gooey and caramelized apple filling- almost like an apple pie. So remove the peels!
What are the best apples for an apple crisp?
The old standard used to be Granny Smith, but I’ll be honest- I’ve NEVER liked an apple pie nor an apple crisp with Granny Smith apples. I strictly use sweeter varieties, like Gala, Fuji, Cosmic Apples, etc. They caramelize so much more easily and are just more pleasant to enjoy!
Should an apple crisp bake covered or uncovered?
Covering the apple crisp for the first 30 minutes of baking. Then we uncover it for the remainder of the baking to let the oat crumble crisp up!
Let me explain: we’re trapping warm air into the filling at first to melt the granulated sugar and really caramelize the apple sugars. The moisture has nowhere to evaporate because it’s trapped, so it helps keep the filling soft, gooey, and caramelized.
After the caramelization process, we can uncover the apple crisp so that the oat crumble on top can continue cooking and crisp up just enough while still keeping the apples below soft, tender and gooey.
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Easy Homemade Vegan Apple Crisp Recipe
- Prep Time: 5
- Cook Time: 50
- Total Time: 55 minutes
- Yield: 10 1x
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
- Diet: Vegan
Description
Gooey, soft caramelized spiced apples and a crisp “buttery” oat crumble make up this ridiculously easy dump-and-bake style vegan apple crisp recipe. It’s basically like an old-fashioned, classic apple crisp- without the dairy, yet you’d NEVER know. You’re just 45 minutes away from the best classic fall comfort dessert, served warm with a scoop of (vegan) vanilla ice cream to finish!
Ingredients
Apple Filling:
- 5 large Gala, Fuji, Golden or Cosmic apples, skin removed and sliced into 1″ chunks
- 1/2 cup (105 g) light brown sugar
- 1 tbsp cornstarch
- 1 tbsp cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon sea salt
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Oat Crumble:
- 1 cup (100 g) rolled oats
- ½ cup (62 g) all-purpose flour
- ½ cup (110 g) light brown sugar
- 1 tbsp cinnamon
- ¼ tsp sea salt
- ½ cup (113 g) salted vegan butter, cold and cubed
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
- Please read through all instructions before beginning.
- Prep: Preheat the oven to 350F and grease a medium sized casserole dish or cast iron skillet with oil. Set aside. Make sure the apples are peeled and chopped. Measure out all remaining ingredients.
- Make the apple crisp filling: In the casserole dish, combine all apple filling ingredients. Toss to evenly coat the apples in the remaining ingredients. Once coated evenly, set aside to make the crumble.
- Make the oat crumble: In a medium bowl, whisk together the oats, flour, light brown sugar, cinnamon, and sea salt. Add in the cubed and cold vegan butter, and much like rubbing butter into pie dough, use clean hands to rub the butter into the flour mixture until it resembles a sandy mixture. Add in the vanilla extract and mix to evenly coat the crumbles. It will seem dry but as long as you rubbed the butter thoroughly to coat all of the dry ingredients, it will bake into a crisp.
- Assemble the apple crisp: Sprinkle the crumble topping on top of all of the apples.
- Bake: Cover with tin foil and place into the oven to bake for 30 minutes, then remove the tin foil and bake the apple crisp for another 15-20 minutes. Remove from oven using an oven mix and let cool for 10 minutes. You can carefully place a piece of tinfoil back over to maintain moisture.
- Serve and enjoy! Serve with your favorite ice cream! Store any leftovers in an air tight container for up to 5 days in the fridge.
Notes
Gluten-free: This recipe work with King Arthur Measure-for-Measure Gluten-Free Baking Flour.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 cup
- Calories: 278
- Sugar: 30.5 g
- Sodium: 123.6 mg
- Fat: 9.4 g
- Saturated Fat: 5.9 g
- Carbohydrates: 46.6 g
- Fiber: 3.4 g
- Protein: 2.3 g
- Cholesterol: 24.4 mg
Is it possible that the spices are suppose to be in teaspoons, rather than tablespoons?
Hi Julie! I used tablespoons, but I like it really spicey- you can reduce to 1.5 tsp for each or 2 tsp each!
It’s Delicious, and a perfect crisp for my 1 year old too! This brings all the fall feelings and is easy to make. I definitely will be serving this for breakfast this week.
I prefer to leave the skins on the apples – can I do this here?
Hi Anna! You can, but the apples might not get “gooey” like they would without skins. It will still taste delicious though!
Foil is made from aluminum, not tin.
Absolutely the best apple ‘crisp’ – I love the moist texture, much more than the drier flake version of other crisps. Maple syrup ALL the way, tastes so much richer than any sugar. After trying many recipes, this is the One! (just baking one in the oven tonight!)
So so happy to hear it!! Enjoy 🙂 Thanks for the review!
i tried this out and used honey instead of maple syrup…amazing well done..turned out perfect!
So happy to hear it!! Thanks for the review!
I made this recipe. I used Teff flour instead of oat flour and I used applesauce instead of maple syrup. I used ample pecans and pumpkin seeds in the crumble. The crisp turned out amazing and I want to thank the author for sharing the recipe!!
So happy to hear it!! Thank you so much for noting what swaps you made too 🙂 So helpful! Enjoy!
Hello! I would like to make this with apple sauce instead of the maple syrup. How much apple sauce did you use? Thank you! 🙂
Can steel oats be substituted for the rolled oats? As I don’t have rolled oats, are there substitutes or can they be omitted?
Hi Debby!
I wouldn’t use steel cut outs, but what you can do, is actually swap in the crumble topping on top of my vegan coffee cake- it will be a bit similar to an apple crumble instead but still delicious! Here’s the coffee cake link: https://thebananadiaries.com/vegan-coffee-cake-gluten-free/
Hi – this looks delicious! Just wondering what size casserole dish works for this recipe? Is it closer to 8×8 or 9×13?
Thanks so much!
Hi Izzy! You can use an 8×8 or a 9×13- either will work. The 8×8 will have a thicker layer of apple however!
Naturally sweet Apple Crisp, but not too sweet – the topping was amazing and this will be our go to Fall dessert from now on! It compliments so many dishes. We topped it with some vanilla ice cream and loved it!!!!
This is so wonderful to hear, thank you!! Enjoy!
Thanks for sharing! Do you top it with anything vegan?
I like it with coconut whipped cream or cashew milk ice cream 🙂
This looks so good! What a great way to still enjoy dessert while sticking to a healthy diet!
Thank you!! Hits the spot 🙂
This recipe is amazing!! Can you tell me what 1/8 of the pan equals in volume? 1 cup or 2 cups = 1 serving. Thanks! It was a family hit!
Aw my goodness, I’m so happy to hear it!! So glad you all enjoyed!! A serving is approx. 3/4 cup! 🙂 Enjoy!!
Hi there! I was planning on making your recipe tonight and was wondering if it is possible to substitute unsweetened applesauce for the coconut oil, as I wanted to make this oil-free? Thank you!
Hi there! I’m so sorry I’m just responding! So I’m not sure the applesauce switch would work for the crisp part in this scenario! I know it would work to add in more maple syrup, but then it might be too sweet!
I LOVE apple-based treats and this is no exception!! What an amazing recipe! Thank you 🙂
Aw thank you so much!! That means the world to me!
Very good! I didn’t have gala, so I used granny smith apples. If I ever do that again, I’ll use more maple syrup or less lemon juice. I also didn’t have pumpkin pie spice or anything other than cinnamon and ginger so I used 1/4 tsp ginger in each (the apples and the topping) and 1 tbsp cinnamon for each, too.