Apple Hand Pies

I. Love. Fall.

I especially love apple picking, apple cider, and then coming home to make tons of apple baked goods. Ideally this would be done with crisp fall air, fall boots, and a colorful scarf. Alas - the weather was more summer today but I still got to apple pick and apple bake!

My first apple creation was these little apple hand pies. They're so adorable and delicious. They're just like an apple pie, but smaller and hand-held. Additionally, to fit the filling into these guys the apples are diced instead of sliced as in a pie. That way, you are guaranteed to get lots of apples in every bite.

These guys were full of the flavors of fall. Nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves, ginger. MmmMMmm the house smelled delicious!

The best part was brushing the tops of these adorable pies with egg and then sprinkling them with large sanding sugar crystals. Absolutely gorgeous, flaky, and yummy! More apple and fall posts to come!!

Apple Hand Pies

Adapted from thefauxmartha.com

For the crust:

You can either make your crust from scratch as detailed in one of our older pie recipes, may I suggest Elyse's pie crust-off post: here

OR you can do what I did, use store bought crust! you'll need 2 crusts. 

For the filling:

About 3 apples of your choosing (mine were picked right off the tree!)

1/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon lemon juice

1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

pinch of salt

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/8 teaspoon nutmeg

1/8 teaspoon cloves

1/8 teaspoon ginger

For the topping:

1 egg slightly beaten

Sanding sugar (optional but recommended) 

Preheat oven to 375. Peel, core, and dice your apples. I would recommend dicing them pretty small so that the pies fold over easily and so that you get lots of apple in each pie. Add in the remaining filling ingredients into your apples. 

Roll out your pie crust to about a 9X9 inch circle (or use store bought) and cut out circles about 4 inches in diameter and 1/8 inch thick. You can use a smaller or larger cutting utensil depending on how large/small your want your pies to be. Ideally a biscuit cutter would work best, but I just used the rim of a glass. You can be creative and use whatever you'd like!. 

For each circle, put a dollop of apple filling in one half and spread some egg wash along the edges of the same half. Fold over the unused side of your crust to make a semi-circle. Crimp the edges with a fork. Wash the top of the pie with some egg and then sprinkle on some sanding sugar. Finally, cut a slit or two in each pie to give the filling some room to spread. Repeat until you are out of dough or filling. 

Bake your hand pies for about 20-25 minutes or until the crust is golden brown and your filling is bubbling. Take them out and let them cool for a bit before eating...lots of them. 

Enjoy!

Sam