We’re obsessed with this mixed berry crisp recipe. A buttery oat topping sits over juicy berries (fresh or frozen berries work!) in this recipe that’s easy to throw together on a whim!
If, some August evening, you find yourself hit with a twinge of nostalgia for summer, and think to yourself “I haven’t done enough summer things! It’s passing me by!” we recommend that you stop, breathe, and take a minute to make this mixed berry crisp. It’s quick enough that, even if you decide to make it after dinner, you’ll have time to have a big bowl before bed and live your best summer life.
For more berry inspo, check out our Best Fresh Berry Recipes!
Mixed Berry Crisp Ingredients
For the mixed berry filling
Mixed berries — you can use fresh berries, or frozen berries, either works! You can even play around with using other combinations of fruit beyond mixed berries. We’ve got some of our favorite fruit crisp filling combinations below.
Flour — the flour will help keep the filling from being overly runny.
Sugar — just a hint of sweetness. Mixed berry crisp is pretty healthy, but it’s still dessert!
Lemon Juice — for a bit of brightness.
For the oat crisp topping
Butter — cold, just like you need for making a Pie Crust.
Brown sugar — gives a rich, caramel sweetness to the topping.
Flour
Rolled oats
A pinch of salt — every dessert needs a little pinch of salt!
How To Make Homemade Berry Crisp:
Prep the berries or other summer fruits! Gently toss the fruit with sugar, lemon juice, flour, salt and cinnamon in the dish you’ll bake the crisp in.
Make the oat crisp topping. Using your fingers, smash the cold, cubed butter into the brown sugar, flour, salt and oats until you’ve got a crumbly, somewhat dough-like bowlful of crisp topping. It won’t look like enough to cover all that fruit, and that’s OK!
Top the crisp and bake! Distribute the crisp topping as evenly as you can, but don’t fret if you still have a fair amount of exposed fruit. Berry crisp is, by nature, a rustic dessert—it’s all about ease, simplicity and showcasing fruit at the peak of ripeness. Bake until the fruit is bubbling up through the topping and the oat streusel is crisp and lovely.
Eat your mixed berry crisp! Ideally, you’ll get to dig in when the crisp is warm from the oven, topped with a generous scoop of vanilla ice cream.
Leftover mixed berry crisp will be good in the fridge for up to 5 days. We also love to eat it for breakfast — vanilla ice cream optional, but recommended!
Mix Up Your Mixed Berry Crisp! Variations We Love
One of the best things about our berry crisp recipe is how adaptable it is. You can use fresh or frozen berries, or even try using different kinds of fruits! Here are some fruit crisp combinations to try:
Blackberry & blueberry crisp — We love to use a combination of two pints of blackberries or Marionberries with one pint of blueberries. The blueberries release a lot of juice as they bake, so an only-blueberry crisp will often be too runny. With a combination of blackberries and blueberries, the naturally-occurring pectin in the blackberries helps prevent the crisp filling from being runny.
Triple berry crisp—try a combo of blueberries, blackberries and raspberries.
Strawberry & rhubarb crisp—the classic early summer rhubarb, treated with a light hand and baked to perfection. Highly recommend it! Or skip the strawberries, and just make a simple Rhubarb Crisp.
Plum & peach crisp—when the stone fruit are coming in so fast you can hardly keep up.
White peach and raspberry crisp—not only delicious, but gorgeous too.
How To Freeze Oat Crisp Topping
In a stroke of genius, we recently began making double batches of our oat crisp topping (also called oat streusel topping) and freezing some of the topping to use later. With oat crisp topping in your freezer you can fresh summer fruit by the flat and know it’ll go to good use. Even Alice Waters—the goddess of fresh, seasonal, local herself—says you should freeze crisp topping. In her iconic book, Chez Panisse Fruit, she writes: “ordinarily we disapprove of freezer storage and cooking in large quantities, but it is a great thing to have a container of crisp topping handy..” Who are we to argue? To freeze it, simply make a double batch of the topping and pop half of it into a freezer-safe container. It’ll keep in the freezer for up to 3 months.
More Gorgeous Summer Berry Recipes
Dessert For Days
For more recipe inspiration, follow us on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and Pinterest or order our cookbook. We love when you share your meals. Tag us on Instagram using #themodernproper. Happy cooking!
