EASY APPLE CRISP from Life is But a Dish

This recipe comes from Life is But a Dish. I used a 13"x9"x3"/4 qt. baking dish. I chose this one because the topping uses a mixture of brown and white sugar, which I prefer. Most use all brown sugar and I'm not a fan of that. I sliced my apples thin then cut them crosswise to make smaller pieces. I omitted nutmeg and lemon juice/zest from the filling and I added 1/2 t. table/fine salt and 2 T. flour to it. I used 7 T. margarine and 3 T. butter in the topping. I softened both slightly in the microwave because it's much easier to cut into flour and oats if it's not hard as a rock. I truly feel that butter is wasted in an all-butter crumb topping. You get the exact same results with using mostly margarine and you don't get the strong butter flavor.

I'll grade this an A- because the filling, which has a large amount of added sugar, had no salt in it but it desperately needed some. I always use a heaping 1/4 t. fine salt per 6 apples no matter how much sugar is added. This had 4 lbs. of apples (8 medium ones) and a full cup of sugar so it's criminal that we weren't told to add any. The recipe states to use "oats" but didn't say which type, quick-cooking or rolled. Someone in the comments asked the author if they could use quick cooking ones and was told by the author that those "should be ok" so I used rolled oats. It should have been made clear in the recipe.

Edit- I think the topping should use 2 T. less each flour and oats. It's more crumbly than it should be, and I think it makes a little too much for this recipe. You taste the topping more than you do the apples, and the cinnamon is too much. I'd use 3/4 of the topping next time for this size pan but it truly is a great one.