Chestnut Free Honey-Nutmeg Apple Crumble Bars
Warm spiced apples, golden crumble, and a drizzle of honey — these bars hit every note you want from a fall bake. The base and topping come together from a single crumble mixture made with rolled oats, rice flour, and tapioca starch, which means less prep and more payoff. Cold butter worked in by hand creates those irresistible pea-sized pockets that bake up crisp and golden on top while staying a little tender underneath. The apple filling gets its depth from ground nutmeg and honey rather than a long list of spices, so the flavor is warm and focused without being fussy. Tapioca starch in the filling helps everything set up cleanly, so when you lift the slab out with the parchment and slice it into bars, they actually hold their shape. For anyone navigating tree-nut concerns, this recipe is naturally free of the usual suspects — no almond flour, no nut-based toppings, just straightforward pantry ingredients doing beautiful work. These are the kind of bars that disappear fast, so cutting into nine generous squares might be the only decision you regret.
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Learn more →Ingredients
9 servings
For the crust and crumble
- 1 cup rolled oats
- ¾ cup rice flour
- ¼ cup tapioca starch
- ¼ cup granulated sugar
- ¼ tsp fine sea salt
- ½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, cold and cut into ½-inch cubes
For the apple filling
- 3 medium apples (about 1 ½ lb), peeled, cored, and cut into ¼-inch slices
- 3 tbsp honey
- ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
- 1 tbsp tapioca starch
- 1 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
Instructions
- 1
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C). Line a 9×9-inch baking pan with parchment paper, leaving a 2-inch overhang on two opposite sides to use as handles for lifting the bars out later.
- 2
In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the rolled oats, rice flour, tapioca starch (the crust-and-crumble portion), granulated sugar, and fine sea salt until evenly combined. Add the cold butter cubes and work them in with a pastry cutter or your fingertips until the mixture resembles coarse, clumpy crumbs with some pea-sized pieces of butter remaining — do not overwork it into a smooth dough.
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