I have been wanting to make Hand Pies since November when I competed in KCRW’s first Good Food Pie Contest.  Waiting in the entry line with my Caramel Pumpkin, I admired one woman’s lovely blueberry hand pies which later that day won Second Prize in the “fruit pie” category. 

A road trip up to Santa Cruz for Memorial Day weekend seemed like a perfect excuse to try out this idea, and some fragrant farmer’s market strawberries and slender pink-and-green rhubarb stalks sealed the deal. 

Excited by my plan for the most perfect picnic pies ever, I started on a crust from my go-to resource for baking, Betty Crocker’s Picture Cookbook (1950).  Now, I’m one of those people who believes a pie crust to be almost sacred.  I wrote recently about my dad making yeast dough, but my mom is the one who fancies herself a pastry chef.  And by that I mean she makes one pie a year, and it has to be perfect.  Eventually there came a time when my brother and I realized that, for our own safety, we ought to leave the house when that annual crust was being made. 

I don’t know how anyone can expect to do something once a year and have it be perfect.  The whole “easy as pie” concept, I’m convinced, only becomes a reality when you make a lot of pies.  Before the pie contest I tried to do some research online about pie crusts and was overwhelmed by a gazillion different theories, from people who make their pie crusts with vodka or vinegar instead of water, to the food-processor school, to those who swear by lard. Gross.  I decided to stick with the tried and true method.  For one thing, I’m one of those butter people (for baking anyway), and was before the whole trans-fats mania.  It just tastes better.  And I don’t even want to know how long that Crisco has been sitting on my mom’s shelf. 

One great technique I learned from the Betty Crocker cookbook: CUT THE BUTTER INTO THE FLOUR IN TWO STAGES. Betty says to cut half the butter in until you achieve a texture like coarse meal; this, she writes, makes for tenderness.  Then, cut in the rest to achieve that famous “small pea stage,” which makes the crust flaky (the butter melts leaving tiny air pockets).  Tenderness and flakiness— you gotta have both!

Once the soon-to-be flaky dough is all pressed into two beautifully swirled, striated discs, they need to chill.  Chilling the dough relaxes the gluten, making the dough easier to roll out.  (One other note: if the dough cracks while I am rolling it, I just gently mush it back together and re-roll.  No need to hurl it at the wall and start over, in tears, like my mom did.) 

I usually let the dough chill overnight, then allow it to come to room temperature a bit while the oven is heating and I prepare my filling.  In this case, I sliced the rhubarb and strawberries a little smaller than I would for a regular size pie.

filling

2 cups rhubarb chunks
2 cups halved or sliced strawberries (this ratio is variable, with the goal being 4 cups of fruit)
1 cup sugar (also variable depending on ratio of fruit as well as sweetness of berries )
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
small sprinkling of freshly grated nutmeg

After I rolled the dough out, I decided to use a 3” biscuit cutter to make little round pies (like the woman at the pie contest did, though hers were bigger).  One batch of crust would thus yield a dozen pies, I reasoned, enough that we could each have 3, not including the ones I would make from the scraps and eat hot out of the oven, a.k.a. “poison testers.” 

After arranging half of the little dough circles on a baking sheet, I topped each with a dollop of fruit, then covered them with the other twelve dough circles. 

Rolling out the top circles a tiny bit more after cutting made them large enough to blanket the little mounds of fruit.  I then pressed around the edges with my fingers to seal, followed by a go ‘round with the tines of a fork.  I cut tiny holes to let the steam escape, then brushed each with milk and sprinkled with sugar, like my grandmother always used to do, to give them a nice golden glaze. 

I baked them at 425 degrees, and of course I forgot to make note of how long for, but I think I started at 30 min and just kept checking until they were golden and the juices inside were bubbling.

In retrospect, perhaps the biscuit cutter idea was a mistake.  For one, they were so small as to have me cursing over the filling and sealing process.  For another, I had at least half my filling left over.  Well, live and learn.  They were not a bad size for eating (about cookie size), and now I have instant pie filling in my freezer.  Additionally, it seems my sealing methods were inadequate, because they leaked juice all over the place during baking. 

No matter, they were a tasty snack/dessert/breakfast for our adventure, and next time I will make two batches of dough, cut the circles bigger, and seal them more tightly.  Here’s my husband holding “the pretty one” for a photo in Santa Cruz: