Jack O'Lantern Apple Toffee Hand Pies
/Makes 8 pies
Ingredients:
1 prepared recipe of pie crust dough, well chilled (See recipe online here!)
Filling:
2 cups peeled and chopped fresh apple, in 1/2" pieces (about 2 medium apples)
¼ cup sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Pinch of salt
1 teaspoon lemon juice
½ cup butterscotch chips
Topping:
1 large egg beaten with 1 tablespoon cold water
Turbinado sugar, for extra crunch and decoration
Procedure:
Prepare the pie dough according to the recipe.
2. Use a well-floured rolling pin to roll the dough out to ⅜-inches thick on a floured surface.
3. Cut the dough with a pumpkin cookie cutter (we used a 4 inch cutter). Reuse the scraps of dough as necessary to avoid wasting dough.
4. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper and place the cut outs, evenly spaced onto the parchment paper. With a small paring knife, create fun Jack O’Lantern faces on 1/2 of the cut out shapes.
5. Place the prepared shapes into the refrigerator, covered, to chill for 15-30 minutes.
6. While the dough is chilling, combine all the filling ingredients. Preparing the filling after rolling out the dough will prevent the apples from sitting and becoming too watery.
7. Preheat the oven to 425°F.
8. Once dough has chilled, remove it from the fridge and, one at a time, brush the edges of each cut out shape with beaten egg.
9. Spoon 2 heaping teaspoons of the filling onto half of the pumpkin shapes.
10. Set the cut out jack o’lantern pumpkin shapes on top of the pumpkins with the filling. Crimp images with a fork
11. Brush the outside surface of the pastry with the egg, then sprinkle with the sugar, and bake for 20-25 minutes, or until golden.