Recipes: Mini apple pies

And we’re back with another recipe! I’ve been dying to do a dessert recipe because that’s my favorite thing to make, but I tried to promote health (weird, right?) and post a couple of more well-rounded recipes first. In honor of my favorite season, we’re tackling mini apple pies.

First, a pep talk: I know this recipe looks long, but the ingredients and instructions are simple even if a little time intensive. Plus you’ll feel super accomplished once you pull it off.

So the cool thing is I went apple picking with my brother last weekend and we got A TON of pesticide-free, not-super-pretty-but-great-for-pie apples. The bad thing is that meant I spent a realllllly long time washing, cutting, peeling, coring, and dicing apples with my best friend (thanks btw). All said and done, we prepped nearly 40 small and medium apples. I don’t recommend it. But it meant I had more than a gallon of apple filling left after making the pies, which I put in the freezer for another day. Because of that, and the fact that I was working off of a recipe for one normal-sized pie, some of the measurements in here are guesstimated. Feel free to make adjustments as needed.

Crust

Pro tip: Prep the crust dough the day before (or at least a few hours in advance) to give it time to refrigerate and save you some time during the bulk of the baking process.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups flour
• 3/4 cup cold butter (a stick and a half)
• 1 tsp. salt
• bit of cold water (I think I ended up using about 1/4 cup)

Instructions:

1. Cube butter — a pastry cutter is best for this, but honestly I’ve used a knife and a cutting board plenty of times
2. Mix flour, butter, and salt slowly. I’d recommend using a food processor, but if you don’t have one (or hate cleaning them like I do), you can do it by hand in a bowl with that pastry cutter
3. Add water to moisten and help get rid of granules until it sticks as one ball
4. Either wrap it and refrigerate it, or roll it out and find something round and about 4.5″ in diameter to cut out the mini crusts

Filling

Ingredients:

• about 6 cups of diced Granny Smith apples (best guess is about 12 medium apples)
• 2 1/2 cups sugar
• 6 tbsp. flour
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• about 4 tbsp. lemon juice

Instructions:

1. Prep the apples. It sucks, and having a corer/peeler is way helpful, but even if you don’t, blast some music and make it happen — your tummy will thank you later (I included the picture above for size reference)
2. Mix ingredients together in large bowl
3. THING I LEARNED: Let that mixture sit for a while while you roll out the dough and prep the little crusts; a bunch of liquid will accumulate from the chemical reactions of the ingredients and you do not want all that liquid in your pie

Crumb Topping

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 cup flour
• 1/4 cup cold-ish butter, cubed

Instructions:

1. Put that pastry cutter back to work and combine until it’s a nice sandy consistency
2. NOTE: You will have extra crumb topping, but this was the smallest accurate ratio

The Whole Deal

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 375ºF
2. Grease and flour two cupcake tins — if you’re a noob at this like me, use butter/Crisco to thoroughly grease each cup, then put in more flour than you think it needs, and shake and roll it until all the cups have a light coating of flour
3. If you haven’t already, roll out the dough and cut it into ~4.5″ rounds (I used the lid of my family’s espresso grinder)
4. Place the dough rounds into the cups and press them in so there aren’t any air bubbles and any waffling (when the edges are wavy) doesn’t create a crack that breaks your crust
5. Fill each crust with about 1/4 cup filling (make sure to avoid the liquid!)
6. Top with a generous amount of crumb topping
7. Bake for about 22-25 minutes (depending on your oven), until golden brown
8. Let cool, and enjoy!

Cost about $12*, makes 22-24 mini pies

Again, I know that was super long, but hopefully it’s a fun recipe to try for a get-together or just because you want pie. Finally, a huge thanks to my boyfriend’s mom for the base recipe (and teaching me how to not screw up apple pie), to my best friend for enduring the process with me, and to my brother for making sure I will not be short on apples for the rest of the season.

In the future, I might add more crumb topping or swap out apples for fresh berries. Overall, though, I was really happy with how these turned out. What are your favorite favorite desserts to make? Let me know in a comment below, on Twitter @ohgrowup, or Instagram @oh.grow.up. Thanks for reading, and happy eating!

*Cost was a real rough estimate on this one because the only ingredient that isn’t regularly stocked in most houses were the apples, for which I paid $5 for like 40+. Sorry if the cost is off, but the point is it isn’t pricey.