• Welcome to 101 Cookbooks, my recipe journal. I primarily feature healthy, vegetarian recipes - with the occasional sweet treat thrown in. To subscribe simply enter your email address, this way you'll never miss a recipe.

Add RSS Feed

The picture of one of these little hand pies in Donna Hay Magazine was absolutely irresistible. A generous pile of juicy raspberries, blueberries, (and I added blackberries) wrapped in a golden, sweetened crust.

The crust for this recipe may be my favorite crust recipe to date. It had a bit more sugar and butter in it than the crust for the pat-in-pan Hazelnut Chocolate Tart I tried a few weeks back (and no ground nuts). It tasted much like a shortbread cookie rolled into a crust --which is essentially what it was, and was deliciously sweet and structured enough to hold up to all the oozing berry juices without getting soggy. A keeper for sure.

The berry mixture for the filling was very simple. I just picked through all my berries to make sure they were all mold-free. Then I tossed them in a bowl with some cornstarch, sugar, and lemon rind.

Next up was the whole crust thing. Made the dough, let it sit in the fridge for a while, pulled it out, cut it into fours, and started rolling. This is where I hit my only snag. I was supposed to roll the dough out to 1/8' thick. Which I did. Then put a pile of the berry mixture into the middle of the pastry. Ok. Then I was supposed to fold up the sides so that the pastry "enclosed the berries." The only problem, was that the pastry didn't want to stay in place, and it didn't really look like the picture...at all. I mean it didn't look bad, I just couldn't get it to look like the picture. Next time I might use a bowl as a guide, then put the prepared pies back in fridge before baking, then pull them out of their 'molds' just before baking. Kind of defeats the whole purpose though.

I also might do an egg wash (or butter wash?) on the crust or something to give it a bit more golden glow. The crust looked nice after baking, but I think it could have looked more inviting and finished.

It seems as if you could put just about anything in the middle of these pies. If I can get the shaping right next time, I might be onto something. Given the choice though, I still like the ease and simplicity of the Broiled Berries + Cream (maybe w/ a side of shortbread) over this recipe.

Never miss a recipe!
Enter your email address to subscribe to 101 Cookbooks via email:

Make a Comment Print Recipe Print with Photo Email this Recipe

Add to del.icio.usAdd to StumbleUponShare on Facebook