No Bake S'mores Pie

This No Bake S'mores Pie is a wonderful way to use the flavors of your favorite campfire treat to create a showstopping dessert. 

You don't need a campfire or metal skewers (or as my Girls Scout troop used to use, untwisted metal hangers) to make this dessert! 

Apple Cider Pie

This apple cider pie is filled with sliced apples that are tossed with sugar, spices, and a boiled apple cider reduction. It's deeply flavored with the tart and sweet essence of apples. 

This apple pie is made with easy-to-find ingredients and is just right for a holiday pie, or for whenever you are craving a slice of this all-American dessert. 

Severed Hand Pies

These severed hand pies are a fun and easy to make Halloween dessert. Fill them with a red-colored fruit (cherry, raspberry, strawberry, or cactus pear) pie filling for a creepy and delicious treat. 

 

All you need to make these little severed hand pies is ready-made pie dough, cherry pie filling, and an egg wash. You can garnish the hand pies with some of the juices in your pie filling or with some raspberry or strawberry dessert topping. 

Tiny Homemade Pop-Tarts

These tiny homemade Pop Tarts are so fun to eat and totally "pop-able." They are perfect for a party, especially for a brunch. 

These tiny pop-tarts, or "pop-tart bites," are a fun treat to serve for breakfast or brunch. Just use your favorite store-bought or homemade pie crust, fill it with your favorite jam, and top it with a bit of royal icing and your favorite sprinkles. 

Creamsicle Meringue Pie

This Creamsicle meringue pie will become your new favorite meringue pie. The combination of orange and vanilla will take you back to memories or your favorite childhood treat. 

What I love about this meringue pie is the amazing combination of Mandarin orange and vanilla flavors. 

Bittersweet Chocolate Caramel Pecan Tarts

These Bittersweet Chocolate Caramel Pecan Tarts are decadent and delicious. They are seriously elegant, and perfect for a small party or a romantic dinner for two.

This recipe for chocolate caramel pecan tarts makes two 4 inch tarts. It's up to you as to how many servings that is. I like a quarter piece, and Mr. Kitchen can easily polish off half a tart (he has the skinny gene). The recipe can also be easily scaled and adapted for a muffin tin or a larger tart. Just bring your geometry skills.

Pecan Caramel Tassies

Pecan Tassies are tiny little pecan pies and a delicious Christmas must-bake dessert. 

I've baked and cooked a lot of pecan treats lately, including pecan brittle, chocolate and pecan butter cups, and pecan butterscotch shortbread cookies, and I have rediscovered how good pecans are.

Blueberry Mini Pies

These blueberry mini pies are the perfect little dessert for a holiday buffet.

Aren't they cute?

These blueberry mini pies are a little rustic looking, because the blueberry filling bubbles up while baking, but that just adds to their charm, right?

Mexican Chicken Pie

This Mexican Chicken Pie, filled with chicken, potatoes, carrots, peas, and corn and topped with a cornmeal and cheese crust is spicy and delicious. 

The cornmeal crust that tops this Mexican chicken pie is super easy to make, plus you can make the dough for the crust in advance and refrigerate it until you are ready to make the pie.

Mini Quiche Lorraine

These mini quiche Lorraine, made with bacon, onions, and Gruyère cheese in a tiny pie crust, are an easy and tasty appetizer or brunch dish.

I served these little quiches as an appetizer on Christmas Eve. It was my turn to host the annual family fête, and with 26 of my most favorite people coming for dinner, I needed appetizers that would pair well with bubbly.

Cornish-Style Steak Pasties

Cornish-Style Steak Pasties - A delicious and portable meat and vegetable hand pie.

Cornish pasties typically are made with beef (usually skirt steak), potatoes, onions, and rutabagas (called swede in Cornwall), which are wrapped in a crust and baked to make a delicious portable meat pie.

Zucchini and Onion Quiche

This cheesy zucchini quiche is loaded with freshly harvested onions and zucchini, the bounty of summer that you can find at farmer's markets right now.

This zucchini and sweet onion quiche is also super cheesy. I used Gruyère in this quiche, but you can use any good melty cheese such as Swiss, Emmental, Monterey Jack, or mozzarella.

Apple Tartlets with Almond Crunch

These Apple Tartlets with an Almond Crunch Topping are so elegant, and yet surprisingly easy to make.

These Apple Tartlets, topped with a mixture of sliced almonds, sugar, and butter that caramelizes while the tarts are baking are both sophisticated and delicious.

Chocolate Mint Pie

This Chocolate Mint Pie is an old fashioned recipe from the 1950s and 1960s, back when the Grasshopper cocktail was popular. 

This Chocolate Mint Pie is often called Grasshopper pie in honor of the famous cocktail that originated in New Orleans.

Blackberry Pie

I am so thrilled with this blackberry pie! Blackberries make such a gorgeous pie filling and they don't need a lot of extra sugar. Plus, I made a pie!!

I made a pie! I am so giddy about this blackberry pie. It's so fresh and fruity, you could almost justify having a slice for breakfast.

Caramel Custard Tart with Sliced Almonds and Pumpkin Seeds

This Caramel Custard Tart with Sliced Almonds and Pumpkin Seeds is so completely decadent and rich. It can also be quite the showstopper with its deep caramel color and the toasted nuts and seeds. I used toasted and salted pumpkin seeds in this tart to compliment the sweet caramel, which turned out to be a great choice. 

Homemade Turkey Pot Pie

The only problem with this turkey pot pie is that you will want it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. It's filling, comforting, and the perfect dish for leftover Thanksgiving turkey.

I love pot pies. Along with meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and macaroni and cheese, they the ultimate comfort food.

You don't have to wait until Thanksgiving to make this pot pie. You can buy a turkey breast or turkey legs and roast them for the filling. If you don't like turkey (and why not?), this recipe also works for chicken.

I found and adapted this recipe from the Thanksgiving leftover section of  The Pioneer Woman Cooks: A Year of Holidays: 140 Step-by-Step Recipes for Simple, Scrumptious Celebrations.

This has got to be one of the most illustrated step-by-step cookbooks ever. If you like illustrations in your cookbooks, this one's for you. I definitely do, and I also love pretty food photos.

I was originally looking for a turkey soup recipe, but this pot pie looked so delicious that I ended up buying a turkey breast just to make this dish. The original recipe says that it's 12 servings, but we managed to stretch it to four. It was that good. In addition, you can make the filling a day before assembling the pie. In fact, I roasted the turkey breast on day one, made the filling on day two, and assembled and baked the final dish on day three.

How's that for a make ahead dish?

Homemade Turkey Pot Pie

Ingredients

4 T butter

3/4 C finely diced onions

3/4 C finely diced carrots

3/4 C finely diced celery

2 C chopped or shredded turkey meat

1/4 C flour

3 C low sodium chicken broth

1/4 tsp turmeric

salt to taste

1 tsp freshly ground pepper

1 dash hot sauce (optional)

1 T chopped fresh thyme

1/4 C heavy cream

1 recipe pie crust of your choice or store bought pie crust

One large egg + 1  tsp water, whisked to use as an egg wash

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F
2. In a large Dutch oven, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the onions, carrots, and celery. 
3. Saute the ingredients for about 3 minutes, until the onions are soft. 
4. Add the turkey, add the flour, stir, and then continue to cook for another 2 minutes. 
5. Add the chicken broth, turmeric, salt, pepper, hot sauce, thyme, and cream.
6. Stir and bring to a simmer. Let cook for about 3 minutes, until thickened. 
7. Pour the filling into a deep dish 2 quart pie dish or casserole dish. 
8. Brush the edges of the pie dish with the egg wash and cover the filling with a pie crust round. Arrange the pie crust so that it will stick to the edges of the pie dish.
9. Slit the pie crust with a sharp knife and brush with the rest of the egg wash. 
10. Place the pie pan on a baking sheet and bake for about 30 minutes, until the crust is a deep golden brown. 
11. Serve in bowls with shards of the crust on top. 

Crusty Apple Pie

Imagine an apple pie that that is mostly crispy and crumbly crust. A pie that has just enough cinnamon apples to keep the two layers of flaky crust apart.

I'm not very practiced in pastry dough (still learning), and when I assembled this pie, I had some trouble rolling out the dough. It was a little dry, and the edges were really jagged. I mean, really jagged, kind of like a map of Sicily. Fortunately the dough was pretty forgiving, and after some patching, I had a couple of rustic circles.

The pie is baked on a baking sheet or pizza pan, not in a pie pan. I baked mine in a dark pizza pan, which resulted in a very crispy bottom crust.

This pie is really good, and the crust, which contains both butter and cream cheese, is really flaky. If you like crust, make this pie. It's kind of a galette with a top crust. I loved it.

This recipe is part of the October Avid Bakers Challenge. We are baking recipes from the King Arthur Flour website.

Crusty Apple Pie Recipe

Slightly adapted from King Arthur Flour

Crust Ingredients

8 1/2 ounces unbleached all purpose flour

3/4 tsp salt

1/2 ounce buttermilk powder

4 ounces cream cheese

5 ounces cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces.

1 1/2 to 2 ounces ice water

Filling Ingredients

1/2 C sugar and 2 tsp cinnamon mixed together

1 1/4 pounds apples (I used Granny Smith), cored, peeled, and halved, and thinly sliced

2 tsp lemon juice

1 ounce salted butter, cut into small cubes

Sparkling sugar and milk for glazing

Instructions

1. In a food processor, add the flour, cream cheese, salt, and buttermilk powder. Pulse about 8 times.
2. Add the butter pieces and pulse a few more times. You should still see butter pieces.
3. Dump the dough out onto your work surface and sprinkle with some of the water and press the dough together to see if it is enough to hold the dough together. Add more water, a little at a time, until the dough just holds together.
4. Divide the dough into a 9 ounce piece and a 10 ounce piece. Form each piece into a disk, wrap each in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes and up to 24 hours. 
5. When you are ready to bake, preheat the oven to 425 F.
6. Lay a piece of parchment on your work surface and roll out the larger piece of dough to a 13 inch circle on top of the parchment. Move the dough, parchment and all, to a pizza pan or rimmed baking sheet.
7. Toss the apple slices in the lemon juice to keep them from browning.
8. Spread the sugar/cinnamon mixture on top of the dough circle.
9. Arrange the apples on top of the cinnamon sugar.
10. Dot the top of the apples with the butter.
11. Roll the second piece of dough out into a 12 inch circle. Lift the dough and place it on top of the apples.
12. Fold the bottom dough edges over the top piece and crimp them together.
13. Brush the dough with milk or cream, and sprinkle the top with sparkling sugar.
14. Cut holes or slits in the top dough.
15. Bake at 425 degrees F for 15 minutes, and then lower the temperature to 375 degrees F. Bake for an additional 25 to 35 minutes. The pie will be done when the crust is golden and the filling is bubbling.
16. Cool on a rack in the pan for at least an hour before slicing. 

Blueberry Hand Pies

The dough for these blueberry hand pies is sort of a cross between puff pastry and pie crust. It involves using a dough with pea sized chunks of butter along with the folding technique to create layers. The dough is very dry and requires some patience to bring together, but the result is a flaky pastry that is still sturdy enough to support a handheld pie. The pastry crust is sugarless, and could easily be used for savory treats. I'm thinking cheeses, meats, tapenades, tomatoes....

My sister and I used to sometimes describe certain foods as "poppable," or if it is really good, "soooo poppable." What does that mean? I guess the best way to capture it is to say that it is portable and slips into your mouth without any hassle. Oh, and delicious. It has to fit all of the categories to be poppable.

A slice a pie that you have to eat with a fork? It may be delicious, but it is not poppable.

A little mini hand held pie? Poppable. So neat and tasty.

For another great hand held poppable pie, check out these summer berry turnovers.

Blueberry Hand Pie Recipe

Adapted from King Arthur Flour

Ingredients

For the Pastry:

8 1/2 ounces unbleached all purpose flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking powder

8 ounces of cold unsalted butter, very coarsely grated into pea sized pieces and placed in the freezer for about 30 minutes

4 ounces sour cream

A few sprinkles of water if necessary

For the filling:

8 ounces of blueberries

1 3/4 ounces sugar

1 T Instant Clear Jel, flour, or cornstarch

2 tsp lemon juice

To finish:

One egg, beaten

Sparkling sugar

Directions

1. Whisk the flour, salt, and baking powder together. Add in the butter pieces and lightly toss with your hands to coat the butter.
2. Add the sour cream and stir until you have a dry dough. 
3. Place the dough out onto a lightly floured counter and knead lightly to bring it together. If it does not come together at all, add a couple of sprinkles of water. The dough should be dry.
4. Roll the dough into a 8 by 10 inch rectangle. Fold it like an envelope, in threes. Repeat once. Wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes and up to one day.
5. While the dough is resting, make the filling by placing all of the filling ingredients into a saucepan and cooking over low heat for about five minutes. Cool.
6. Roll the dough out into a 14 inch by 14 inch square. Cut into 16 pieces with a pizza cutter or a 3 1/2 inch square cookie/biscuit cutter. 
7. Place 8 of the pieces onto a parchment lined cookie sheet.
8. Brush the edges with the beaten egg.
9. Spoon the fruit evenly onto each of the eight pieces.
10. Using a small cookie cutter, cut a piece out of each of the remaining dough pieces. If you don't have a tiny cookie cutter, just slit the top crust with a sharp knife. 
11. Place the pieces on top of the filled pastry pieces, and seal with a fork or a pie crust crimper.
12. Place the cutout onto the top (where it used to be before you cut it out) and brush the pies with the rest of the egg wash. Sprinkle with sanding sugar. 
13. Bake for 20 minutes, until golden, and cool for at least 20 minutes. 
14. Enjoy!

I am participating in the Avid Baker's Challenge. We are baking goodies from King Arthur Flour all year. To join or see others' results with this recipe, head on over to the Avid Baker's Challenge webpage. 

Chocolate Covered Cherry Almond Tarts

These little chocolate covered cherry almond tarts are comprised of a flaky crust and a creamy almond filling topped with fresh cherries that are coated with a chocolate ganache.

Flaky crust... Almond pastry cream... Fresh cherries...  Chocolate ganache.... All baked into two 4 1/2 inch tartelette pans.  The combination of flavors works beautifully and makes a wonderful summer dessert for two... or four if you don't mind sacrificing the style factor and serving them cut in half. You could always add a dollop of vanilla ice cream. Summer!

While the tart is inspired by chocolate covered cherries, in this tart, the cherries are fresh and not coated with a sugary syrup.

For the crust, I used some leftover dough I had in the freezer. The recipe for the dough is the same as the one from this apple tart. Any recipe for your favorite pie crust will do. Just make enough for a crust bottom. I love this one because it is amazingly tender and flaky. It's my favorite crust recipe.

Recommended tools/equipment for these tarts: 

1. Two 4 1/2 inch to 4 3/4 inch tartelette pans with removable bottoms. If you're good at geometry, you could substitute one or three different sized pans. 
2. A food processor, ideally a mini food processor.You'll need this to mix up the almond cream filling. 
3. A cherry pitter. You can make this dessert without one.. and who needs another single use kitchen gadget? In this case, me. I love my little cherry pitter, even if it's single use. It doesn't hurt that one of my grandkids is a cherry lover and helps me pit the cherries with this gadget. I can't seem to find the one that I use available on line, but I'm sure that the multiple ones that are available are all good. Just check the reviews.