Our icy, cold winter has produced unbelievably luscious raspberries so I’m baking RASPBERRY HAND PIES! For whatever reason, I’m fixated on hand pies. I know, so strange. I think it might be the idea of not using a fork…
If you’ve stopped by my site over the last few days and found it gone, I’ll sum it up with the explanation, ‘ I was experiencing some technical difficulty’. I promise that I didn’t intend to be away so long.That’s a huge understatement but hopefully – fingers and toes crossed – it’s all behind us. Please accept my apologies for any inconvenience. While I was missing in action, the girls were home to celebrate Meggie’s marriage to Theo and their pregnancy. Hmmm…that sounds a little suspicious – lol. Truly, my site was down but here I am and good to go! I can’t wait to share Meggie and Theo’s party with you. I won’t have the photos for a bit so I’m holding off until they arrive. I want you to be able to see the whole picture.
SPOILER ALERT: It was awesome!
RASPBERRY HAND PIES
PASTRY
Makes 25 hand pies
Preheat oven 425*F
5 1/2 cups all – purpose flour
2 teaspoons salt
1 lb lard, room temperature
1 egg
1 tablespoon white vinegar
ice water
FILLING:
1 quart fresh raspberries
1 cup sugar mixed with 2 tablespoons of cornstarch
THE STEPS:
- Place flour and salt in a large mixing bowl and stir well.
- Cut lard into the flour with a pastry blender until it resembles a coarse meal.
- Beat egg in the bottom of a one-cup measure.
- Add vinegar then fill cup with ice water.
- Pour mixture over flour and combine with a fork until it forms a mass. At this point, I put on a pair of disposable rubber gloves and finish working the lard into the flour.
- Place pastry on a floured surface and knead several times.
- Divide pastry into 5 equal parts.
- Flour surface again and roll out one piece of dough to ¼“ thickness. Add more flour if the pastry is sticking. Make sure that you are applying even pressure on your rolling-pin so that your pastry is able to bake evenly!
- With a dry pastry brush, sweep off excess flour.
- Cut out 5 – 5” circles then place 2 tablespoons of fruit in the center.
- Brush two connecting edges with beaten egg and fold on the diagonal over the filling, pressing to seal.
- Repeat process .
- Place hand pies on parchment lined baking sheet.
- Using a pair of clean scissors, snip the center of one side of each hand pie to allow steam to escape.
- Place baking sheet in oven for 10 minutes then reduce oven temperature to 350*F
- Bake until crusts are golden brown and filling is bubbling, 15 to 20 minutes.
- Cool slightly on a wire rack.Serve warm.
THE LOVE: The beautiful thing about pie pastry is how well it freezes. If you’d prefer to make fewer hand pies, freeze the left-over pastry for another use.
one year ago: zucchini, wild mint and toasted hazelnut salad with raspberries
two years ago: fresh raspberry pie
three years ago: zucchini carpaccio
Thanks for reading.
