Baking| Apple Strawberry Basil Hand Pies from Beantown Baker {SRC}
“Looks like you could use an extra hand.”
American Pie
We’re already trotting through the second week of September, the days are whizzing by! Just when I thought I’d done the SRC for the month, a Plum Almond Ginger Summer Fruit, I found a reminder in my inbox. Whoa we’re into the next month, a race against time as always, yet this club is fun! I made delicious Apple Strawberry Basil Hand Pies that I picked & adapted from Beantown Baker, my secret blog for September.
The Secret Recipe Club is the brainchild of Amanda of Amanda’s Cookin’.
The idea behind the club – Each month you are “assigned” a participating food blogger to make a recipe from. It’s a secret, so don’t tell them you are making something from their blog! Click on the link if you want to join the fun!!
Jen @ Beantown Baker lives in Boston with her hubby and two cats. She works as an engineer by day, and is baker by night when she gets home and enjoys spending her free time in the kitchen. She loves all desserts and has a huge to-bake list. Her hubby serves as her number one taste tester and her lucky coworkers and friends get to enjoy baked goods on a regular basis. It was wonderful to explore her blog as we seem to have so much in common, beginning with a ‘love for baking’! It was like a treasure chest, I flitted from one post to another, so much to do and so little time! I thought I’d bake these utterly delicious looking Strawberry Peach Basil Bars but sadly the stone fruit season has drawn to an end. Then I chanced upon these Strawberry Hand Pies …YES!! I’ve been charmed by hand pies forever but have never got down to making these sweetly delicious sorts! They reminded me of pop tarts! I went with whatever fruit I had on hand… apples and frozen strawberries. In a last minute moment of inspiration, I threw in some fresh basil! YUM! I also tried a few different shapes, including a roll up and a lattice!They turned out to be delicious, though I think I rolled the dough a tad too thin. As Jen says, “The pastry dough is VERY easy to work with. And quite tasty.” I kept my pies vegetarian and gave the pastry a low fat cream wash, followed with a sprinkling of vanilla sugar. Hand pies are convenient food, great grub on the go and and can be sweet or savoury. Almost every culture has a version of their own, mostly baked.
Hand pies are semilunar-shaped pastries with either a sweet or savory filling, formed by placing a dollop of filling onto a circular piece of biscuit-style dough and then folding it over and crimping it shut. They may be baked, fried or deep-fried.
English Cornish pasties are said the most famous in this category, and go back to the 1800’s when miners wives would freshly bake shortcrust pastry with a beef filling, and pop the pies wrapped in a towel or newspaper into the miners pockets. Miners would hold the pies with the crimped edges, their hands dirty with arsenic and coal etc, eat the pie and throw away the crimped edge.
Many countries have popular versions of hand pies. India has the addictive samosa, a savoury patty, deep fried and absolutely delicious. Traditionally with a stuffing of potatoes, peas {and sometimes cottage cheese and raisins}, the filling is wrapped in a triangle of pastry and deep fried. We munched through cartloads of these in school, college and while I was working. I have a Chicken Mince Cocktail Samosa posted here which makes for great cocktail / party snacks. Other versions include the Spanish empanada, the Italian calzone & Jamaican patties. Have you heard of any others? OK we have more … Malaysian curry puffs {thank you Jehanne@ The Cooking Doctor}, Indian gujiya {thank you Fahad @ Simply Fahad-istic}.
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Recipe: Apple Strawberry Basil Hand Pies
Summary: Delicious and comforting hand pies, charming bites somewhat like pop tarts. Dough from Alton Brown, filling from Dinner and Dessert, originally from Smitten Kitchen – makes about 15. Adapted from Beantown Baker
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Total Time: 45 minutes
Ingredients:
- Pastry Dough
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 75gm unsalted butter, chilled
- 3/4 cup milk
- Juice of 1/2 lime
- Filling
- 3-4 apples, peeled, cored, diced small
- 1 cup frozen strawberries, chopped fine in processor
- Juice of 1/2 lime
- 1/4 cup flour
- 1/4 cup sugar
- Pinch of salt
- 1/2 vanilla bean, scraped
- Handful of fresh basil, chiffonaded
- Glaze
- 2 tbsp low fat cream { or an egg wash of 1 egg mixed with 1 to 2 teaspoons water}
- 1 sachet vanilla sugar
Method:
- Make the Filling
- Toss all ingredients well in a big bowl, and keep aside.
- Make the Pastry Dough
- In the bowl of a food processor, combine the flour, baking powder and salt. Pulse for a few seconds and then pour into a large mixing bowl.
- Add the shortening and knead it into the flour with your hands until it is crumbly.
- Add the milk all at once and mix in with a spatula until it begins to come together.
- Lightly flour your hands and the countertop and turn the dough out onto the countertop. Knead the dough ball, folding over 10 to 20 times. {Thermomix: Add flour, baking powder and salt to TM bowl. Run on Speed 6/5 seconds. Add remaining ingredients and run on Speed 6/ 7 seconds. Turn to knead and run for 1 minute.}
- Using a rolling pin roll the dough to 1/3 to 1/2-inch thickness, then cut into rounds using a 2 1/4-inch ring. Roll each round as thinly as possible or to 5 to 6 inches in diameter.
- Spoon 1 to 2 tablespoons of filling onto the dough, brush the edges of half of the dough lightly with the cream / egg wash, fold over and seal the edges together with the tines of a fork, dipping it into flour as needed. Gently press down to flatten and evenly distribute the filling and snip or cut 3 slits in the top of the pie.
- Brush a little bit of cream / egg wash on the outside of the pie and sprinkle with vanilla sugar.
- To bake pies, preheat the oven to 180C. Place finished pies onto a lined cookie sheet and bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until golden brown.
- Serve warm {after about 20 minutes as the filling can be very hot} or at room temperature. We liked them chilled too with a drizzle of unsweetened low fat cream as dessert!
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Don’t miss a post Also find me on The Rabid Baker, The Times of India
47 Comments
chinmayie @ love food eat
Looks so scrumptious! Apple is any bake is delicious! Makes me want to pick one up right off the screen!!
Rosa
Beautiful pies! I realy love the addition of basic. Very original. Lovely clicks too.
Cheers,
Rosa
Monique
They look and sound so good:)
I love smaller individual things~
beautifully presented as always~
Sommer@ASpicyPerspective
Deeba, I’m in love with this take-along treat!
Barbara @ Barbara Bakes
I made Jen’s hand pies too. They were gone in a flash. Sounds like a great flavor combination.
Alison @ Ingredients, Inc.
These look amazing!
india-leigh@aveganobsession
Your blog is SO beautiful. I see how much you love baking and photography. Your hand-pies made me happy just looking at them!
Carolyn
These look amazing, bursting with fruit flavour. A perfect pick for the SRC!
Shumaila
Isn’t apple the flavor of the day! Love the pictures and love your pick for SRC. As always Deeba you have made a great looking (and I bet tasting) dessert!
jehanne@thecookingdoctor
yet another gorgeous bake, deeba..and to answer you, Malaysian curry puffs are almost like samosa..I’ve got a draft written on it, sitting there collecting dust as the pics are so lousy..:-(
Deeba @ PAB
You are sweet Jehanne! Thanks for the info. Will update it on the post! They sound delicious,
Melissa@IWasBornToCook
Gorgeous! Love the flavor combination.
cooking rookie
Apple strawberries and basil… that’s an unusual flavor combination! I should try that sometime – very curious to see what the basil adds to the fruit. The pies look gorgeous for sure 🙂
Maia
Basil – what a fresh addition! I definitely would not be as likely to discard the crimped edge like those miners…
sara
So cute! Love these little pies…they look really delicious and like lots of fun! 🙂
Lisa
I’ve always wanted to make fruity hand pies. especially since I knew there had to be better than than the packaged brands I grew up. Yours look amazing, Deeba, and have catapulted my need to make them soon! Couldn’t have chosen and ‘rocked’ a better recipe!
Barbara
I do love baking sweets with herbs, Deeba. The fruits you used are really good together and I love the way you presented those adorable little gems.
Monica Smith
The English Cornish pastie is a great way to use left overs but it is baked not fried.
Priya
Fabulous pies,looks incredible..
Tadka Pasta
So adorable and irresistible! You’ve put together an interesting combo of flavors.
sandhya@vegetarianirvana
How charming, you push the limit in baking sooo much. Enjoyed your recent interview.
Lisa~~
Your pies look wonderful and I love all your design variations.
If you haven’t already, I’d love for you to check out my SRC recipe this month: Welsh Cakes.
Lisa~~
Cook Lisa Cook
Barbara | Creative Culinary
The basil has me intrigued Deeba…I guess it is unfair to relegate it to only savory dishes so I’ll be adventurous next time too. They look so beautiful…too pretty to eat. But I would if you forced me!
Si
Wow. These look absolutely wonderful. Your phots are beautiful !
Katrina
Beautiful photos as always. Love the idea of adding basil to the strawberry filling! Great post.
Trisha
Sounds like a delicious find. They look so nice and rustic!
Camilla
Strawberry + Basil. Wow. This looks fantastic. Can’t wait to give it a shot. Thanks for sharing with the SRC.
Fahad Khan
This might sound silly of me,but in India we have a sweet named ‘gujia’,these pies reminded me of it.The reason – gujias look just the same,though they are very different,they are filled with a mixture of wholemilk fudge and nuts.
Thank you for sharing this recipe.:-)
Deeba @ PAB
Not silly at all Fahad, I think it’s a wonderful add. It’s strange that it didn’t strike me. Off to add it to the list! Thank you!
Sally Prosser
I’d never heard of hand pies but I’m an expert on eating Cornish pasties (actually my husband is as he eats one every day when we are on holiday in UK). These look so pretty and delicate – I love the strip of fabric round the top of the milk bottle. Basil with strawberries – two summery tastes that I adore.
Heavenly Housewife
I love the idea of combining sweet fruit with herbs that one might consider savoury. Too bad I just recently killed my basil plant. I might have to go out and buy another one now to make these beautiful pies.
*kisses* HH
Anita Menon
These pies look fascinating. They look like a bigger, fruitier version of our local gujjiya.
I would love to try this one and when I do, I ‘d let you know.
Rituparna
Yummy … pies. What a unique combination & delicious photographs.
Magic of Spice
These are just so pretty and they sound absolutely scrumptious!
Gloria
Your handpies look delicious. Handpies are on my baking to do list. I’m so intrigued by the combination of fruit and basil. Beautiful photos!
Gera@Sweets Foods Blog
You know Deeba in my country these pies are called sweet empanadas.
As you guess I love them, more if they have strawberry and apple inside 🙂
Cheers,
Gera
Sylvie @ Gourmande in the Kitchen
Ooo, basil and strawberries are such a nice pairing!
AmandaP
This looks delicious, and I love all the extra information! I have some fresh apples in my fridge and a basil “tree” in my front yard…think I know what I’ll be doing this weekend 🙂
Julia @ Mélanger
Deeba, just lovely. Now I’ve been charmed by hand pies, too. 🙂
Deeba @ PAB
Did you know that I thought of little Ms Mélanger while editing the pictures?
foodwanderings
OMGoodness Deeba, I always liked the half moon shaped hand pies whether sweet or savory. Love the added basil into the mix I never combined as of yet basil into sweet, maybe now that you did I would brave it!! 🙂
Vijitha
They look fantastic.
Vivian thiele
I love hand pies but have never tried making my own. Great SRC choice
Shelby
Love these pies, your photos are amazing as always! I really love the basil in your recipe!
Christine
Hi Deeba, Your Apple Strawberry Basil Hand Pies recipe has been selected to be featured in a Recipe Guessing Game. Please share the following link with your friends and fans. To play, go here: Congrats again!! 🙂