Mini Fruit Pies and Hand Pies #Recipe by @LibbyKlein

 Libby Klein Summer is fruit pie season! Whether you're celebrating Independence Day or at a family reunion picnic, what makes a better dessert than fruit pie? So many lovely fruits to choose from this time of year. I couldn't decide which one I like the best so I made five kinds. You'll need a mini pie pan like I have, or you can make hand pies like the kind that come individually wrapped in the convenience store.

Disclaimer - Read all your labels to make sure your ingredients are gluten-free. Gluten can be sneaky.

Mini Fruit Pies and Hand Pies

Serves: 6

 

Flaky Gluten-Free Pie Crust

Ingredients:

3 cups one-to-one Gluten-Free blend (or all-purpose flour)
1 tsp salt
1 and 1/2 cups good butter, cold
1 egg
1 TBSP neutral vinegar
1/3 cup ice water

Directions:

Blitz your flour and salt in the bowl of your food processor. Add your butter in cubes and blitz until the mixture is crumbly. Beat your egg and vinegar together. Blitz into the crumbly dough. Add your ice water in small amounts with the food processor on and watch the dough come together. Only add enough water to make a cohesive pastry dough. You don't want it too dry, but you should be able to pat it into a ball and flatten it to a disc pretty easily. Wrap the disk in plastic wrap and chill while you make the fillings. 

Fruit Fillings

Ingredients:

Either 

4 cups Strawberries, 

or 4 cups Blackberries, 

or 4 cups Peaches, peeled and sliced with a teaspoon of nutmeg

or 4 cups Blueberries with a pinch of mace

or a combination of the above

AND

1 cup sugar

3 Tbsp cornstarch

1 Tbsp lemon juice

Additional ingredients if you're making the hand pies.

1 egg for an egg wash pre-baking

1 cup confectioners sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1-2 Tbsp water

Directions:

Place 4 cups of the fruit of your choice in a saucepan. You can see that I like to add a little spice depending on the fruit. Add the sugar, cornstarch, and lemon juice. Cook on low until the fruit has rendered its juices and the mixture comes to a boil. Cook for a couple of minutes until the fruit mixture thickens. If you are using peaches, cook a couple minutes longer until they soften a bit. You just made pie filling. Set it aside to cool. What you don't bake in a crust you can use to top ice cream waffles, pancakes, etc.

  

Roll out your pastry dough and either cut into rounds for mini-pies
or cut to fit in your pie plate. 

Mini Pies

If you're using a pie plate for mini-pies, you'll want to blind back the shell. Prick with a fork or use pie weights and bake the shell at 350 degrees for twenty minutes. Then fill each shell with your pie filling and pop back in the oven for another 20 minutes. The filling will get all bubbly and the edges of your pie crust will brown. Remove from the oven and let cool before serving.

Hand Pies

If you're making min-pies like I did here, just be sure not to roll the dough too thick. These small hand pies don't hold a lot of filling and you don't want them to be pop-tarts. At least not today.

Transfer your rounds to a parchment-lined baking sheet. Top each one with a spoonful of pie filling just in the middle. Run the rolling pin over the next cut-out to make it slightly larger than the bottom. Stretch it over the fruit filling and crimp the edges together. 

Beat that extra egg with 1 TBSP water to make an egg wash. Brush over the top crust of the hand pies. Bake at 350 degrees for twenty minutes or until your crust is golden brown. 

When cool, make your vanilla glaze by mixing together the confectioners sugar with the vanilla and just enough water to make a smooth and slightly runny icing. Place your hand pies on a baker's rack over sheets of parchment paper or foil. Spoon the finished glaze over your hand pies. The glaze will coat the top of the pies and set to a nice finish.

 Poppy McAllister discovers that gluten-free Halloweens can scare up another case of murder in the latest installment of this delightful culinary B&B mystery series! - Kirkus Reviews

Poppy is none too pleased when her B&B is coerced into participating in the Cape May Haunted Dinners Tour during Halloween season. Though her knack for finding dead bodies has given the place a spooky reputation, the Murder House is a completely undeserved nickname. At least it used to be . . .
 
While Poppy wrangles with some guests who can’t stop squabbling with each other—including a paranormal researcher, a very quirky pet psychic who freaks out her portly Persian, and an undercover tabloid reporter eager to catch her staff in a lie—one of them winds up facedown in a plate of tiramisu. And now she has bigger worries than getting her house TP’d . . .
 
Includes Recipes from Poppy’s Kitchen!
 

Libby Klein grew up in Cape May, NJ where she attended high school in the '80s. Her

classes revolved mostly around the Culinary sciences and Drama, with one brilliant semester in Poly-Sci that may have been an accident. She loves to drink coffee, bake gluten-free goodies, collect fluffy cats, and translate sarcasm for people who are too serious. She writes from her Northern Virginia office where she serves a very naughty black smoke Persian named Sir Figaro Newton. You can keep up with her shenanigans by signing up for her Mischief and Mayhem Newsletter on her website. www.LibbyKleinBooks.com/Newsletter/

Peach Pie with Cinnamon Gluten-free #recipe from author @DarylWoodGerber

From Daryl:

My latest book is out, another suspense. It's earning nice reviews on Amazon and Goodreads and elsewhere. Check it out HERE. 

What's it about?

A chilling murder, an elusive killer, and a family mystery that hits too close to home . . .

What's to eat?

Well, I'm on a deadline. Another book due. Oy! I really over-scheduled myself this year, either that or time has lost a few hours of each day.  Did someone forget to tell me that there are now only 22 hours in each one? I feel like I'm never getting enough sleep and always behind. I pray 2020 will be a little more forgiving with the old tick-tock.

So forgive me, in the interest of saving time, I used a premade pie shell to make this delicious pie. It's all about the peaches, anyway. We are nearing the end of peach season (sob!) so if you want peach anything, you'd better get cracking.

FYI, this pie filling would taste great all by itself, so feel free to bake it sans pie crust and serve with ice cream.

Does the pie need the whipped cream? Um, no. I was simply in the mood when I was taking pictures. It's plenty sweet without it. :)  But who can say know to whipped cream.  Did I make it from scratch? Nope. In the interest of saving time...   LOL 

PEACH PIE

(gluten-free version * regular, see below)

4 large peaches

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup corn starch

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 cup butter (4 tablespoons)

1 gluten-free pie shell  (I know it's cheating...but I'm on a deadline...)

Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.

In a small bowl, mix brown sugar, regular sugar, cornstarch, nutmeg, and cinnamon. Cut in the butter. Sprinkle half the mixture in the pie shell.

Peel the skin off the peaches. Slice and arrange the slices in a circle on top of the sugar mixture. Cover with the remaining sugar mixture.

Bake 450 degrees for 10 minutes.

Reduce heat and bake 350 degrees F for 18-20 minutes more.

The pie will be very hot. Let cool to room temp. If you refrigerate overnight, the filling set better, but if you want to serve warm, just know the filling will ooze.  J  Deliciously.

*For regular peach pie, use a regular flour shell. Yep, that's all that is different.  :)

Order DESOLATE SHORES HERE, trade paperback and e-book

SAVOR THE MYSTERY!

 

Friend Daryl and Avery on Facebook
Follow Daryl on Twitter
Follow Avery on Twitter
Follow both of us on Pinterest
Plus check out my website

Follow Daryl on Bookbub

A SOUFFLÉ OF SUSPICION, the 2nd French Bistro Mystery.

Can Mimi prove her chef innocent before the chef gets dusted?

Click here to order.

A DEADLY ÉCLAIR, the 1st French Bistro Mysteries, in all formats.

Can Mimi clear her name before the killer turns up the heat?

Click here to order.

SIFTING THROUGH CLUES, the 8th Cookbook Nook Mystery.
Sifting through the clues, Jenna unearths any number of possible culprits, but she’ll have to cook up a new way to catch the killer before her friend Pepper’s goose is cooked. 
Click here to order. 

WREATH BETWEEN THE LINES, the 7th Cookbook Nook Mystery.

Jenna Hart is busy decking the halls and ducking a killer

Click here to order.

FOR CHEDDAR OR WORSE, the 7th Cheese Shop Mystery by Avery Aames.

Finally there's going to be a cheese festival in Providence!

Click to order.

GIRL ON THE RUN, a stand-alone suspense.
When a fairytale fantasy night becomes a nightmare, Chessa Paxton must run for her life...but will the truth set her free?

Click to order

DAY OF SECRETS, a stand-alone suspense

A mother he thought was dead. A father he never knew. An enemy that wants them dead.

Click here to order

DESOLATE SHORES, an Aspen Adams novel of suspense

In the secrets lies the truth...

Click here to order