MANILA, Philippines – If you’re berry obsessed with strawberry desserts and sweet pies, you might just crumble for this one by Crumbs and Grubs – the local Quezon City bakery serves up a freshly-baked Strawberry Crumble that’s sweet, tangy, and comforting all in one.

Crumbs and Grubs sells the 7″ round pie (P888) with a sweet brown butter crumble on top, mixed in with jammy, fresh Benguet strawberries that are juicy, tangy, and freshly-picked. The buttery crumble adds a solid chew from the rolled oats, a slight crunch from the sugar, and a comforting cinnamon flavor, while the local strawberries mashed into a chunky pulp provide a nice and tart contrast to the sweetness. It’s got good balance, and tastes even better with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top!

It tastes fresh and homemade, made with no preservatives, no artificial flavors, no extenders, and only natural ingredients. They are baked from scratch daily in small batches, and lovingly takes 8-10 hours from prep to finish. Crumbs and Grubs’ owners told Rappler that most of the production time is spent meticulously cleaning and preparing the strawberries for baking.

“We work a lot with local farms from Benguet and have it shipped to Manila on the day of baking. It’s tedious, it’s risky, it takes too much time but that’s what it takes to deliver quality products that our customers deserve,” they said.

Since it’s a harvest-dependent product, Crumbs and Grubs will keep the Strawberry Crumble available for pre-order until March, or until supplies last. Whenever strawberries are in season, it’ll be back!

Berries are life

Crumbs and Grubs do love their berries – the SME actually first rose to Instagram fame after its best-selling strawberry-filled croissants took off in the pandemic in 2021.

“We’d receive a lot of requests and orders for it through the years. As much as we’d love to serve them again, we also have to innovate and offer something new to offer,” they said.

What Crumbs and Grubs did was tweak the well-loved formulation also highlighting Benguet’s best produce and turned into a pie – a strawberry base with an updated classic crumb recipe to “complement the texture and flavors of our beautiful fresh local strawberries.”

Crumbs and Grubs started out as a micro-bakery in 2010, providing specialty breads, savory pastries, and desserts to neighborhood restos, coffee and milk tea shops, and family and friends.

“I would bake in the morning and go door-to-door along establishments in Katipunan and Teacher’s Village to offer whatever I made in the hopes of leaving with a contract to supply. Laughing at the thought now because that was so daring and totally crazy!” Crumbs and Grubs’ owners said.

In 2011, the owners added vegan lactation cookies, muffins, and granola for expecting and breastfeeding moms and organic, healthy desserts for the family that weren’t heavily processed or laden with sugar.

“I grew up in the family business of confections. My mom was a pioneer local chocolatier who built her chocolate workshop out of our family home. She was one of the first few who produced chocolates in the ’90s and at one time, was one of the top suppliers of Rustan’s supermarket,” the owners said.

“My siblings and I saw all her countless struggles and wins as a small business owner. That inspired me to explore a similar path and like her, my passion led me here — in the industry of creating, serving, and delighting people,” they added.

Crumbs and Grubs’ advocacy has always been to support our local famers and promote local ingredients. That’s why our cherished local strawberries have always been the star of the bakery’s show, even if it can be a challenge to deal with local suppliers, the bakery said.

“We always encounter issues like erratic pricing and supply availability, even unreliable suppliers. It’s a tough battle to win and we have to sacrifice margins and production at times, but we do what we can to help local farmers put food on the table and drive consumer awareness on the bounty local produce brings,” they said.

“We have excellent local produce that don’t receive much attention and that’s really sad. We’ve been fighting this battle for more than a decade, why stop now?”

Crumbs and Grubs also sells fresh grass-fed burrata and mozzarella. The commissary is located in Mapayapa Village, Don Antonio, Quezon City. To place your orders, you can message them on Instagram or order through the website. – Rappler.com