Recipe Swap - A Girl in Transit

Happy Fall everyone! My name is Sarah and I'm visiting from my blog, A Girl In Transit. I'm here today sharing my take on the classic apple pie, Mini Scandinavian Apple Pies. In this particular recipe I'm using butter flavored shortening instead of butter (at this time I am unable to eat dairy while I nurse my newborn... yes he's THAT sensitive *sigh*). Good news is that I've still received excellent feedback even with this minor adjustment. I'm also sharing a little tip on rolling out the pie crust. The fact that we are going to make mini pies makes the dough much easier to work with so never fear, making pie crust really isn't as bad as everyone say it is. Also See my rendition of the Mini Scandinavian Jelly Pies and my Pie Pops

Thank you so much Meg for letting me share one of my fall favorites with you all. She's such a sweet heart and her blog is so sincere. She's going to be over at my place sharing one of her favorite fall recipes as well, so don't miss out!

Lets begin...

Pie Crust

Makes about 12 Mini Pies

(I would double the recipe of the crust or split in half the recipe of the filling. Otherwise you'll have a lot of filling left over.)

Ingredients:

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup of shortening

Ice water

Filling, recipe below

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

In a medium-mixing bowl cut the shortening and salt into the flour by hand or with a pastry blender until it's the texture of cornmeal. Sprinkle 1 tablespoon of ice water over the mixture and mix just until the dough is moistened. Repeat by adding 6 to 8 tablespoons water (one at a time) until all the dough is just moist. Take care not to over mix.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Divide the dough in half and roll into two balls. One ball for the tops and one ball for the bottoms. Roll 1 ball out (see rolling out tip below) and cut out circles with a cookie cutter that is roughly 2-2.5 inches across. Do the same with the 2nd ball. Transfer the bottoms to a non-stick or Silpat lined cookie sheet, careful not to stretch the dough.

Tip: Instead of over flouring the dough while rolling it out, like seen above, sandwich the lightly floured dough between two pieces of wax paper. Then roll out dough to desired thickness. I make mine a bit on the thinner side since it's the size of a cookie and you don't want too much dough. 

Pie Filling

(Remember to either double the pie crust or split in half the pie filling ingredients to have matching portions. The recipe I used is for a pie and me tweaking it to make mini pies has messed with the portions a bit. I usually double the crust, make 12 mini pies, and make a whole regular sized pie in addition)

Ingredients:

1/2 cup to 1 cup all-purpose flour

6-7 cups (about 5 apples) cut into thin sliced cubes. (I used Granny Smith. Remember the more "freckles" on the apple, the sweeter it is)

1 cup white sugar

1 cup brown sugar

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 egg white

In a medium bowl or stand mixer, combine the apples with the brown and white sugar. Add flour, cinnamon and continue mixing until they are well coated. 

Add roughly 1 table spoon of apple filling per pie bottom. Wet the edges with water or egg white to act as a glue to seal the top portion of the pies. Add pie tops. Poke holes or slits to allow steam to escape when baking. Brush the assembled pies with egg white. If desired sprinkle some cinnamon sugar on the tops of each pie. 

Bake for 20-25 minutes depending on your oven.

Original recipe that I tweaked for this version.

Yum Sarah! I definitely will be making these soon but I don't have any cute little helpers like Sam. Her hands are so precious next to the mini pies.