Raspberry-Lemon Mini Pies

It must be pie week in the Rainy Baker household! Coincidentally, after baking my Meyer Lemon Pie yesterday afternoon, we learned new pie techniques later that evening in class. This left me with a lot of leftover pie dough. Mini pies are all the rage right now, appearing all over foodgawker and the blogasphere. I have never tackled mini pies before and thought this would be an excellent use for my scraps of pie dough. This is a good reason to always save any extra pie dough you may have! I also had leftover raspberries and Meyer Lemons from previous baking experiments and thought these would be a lovely combination for my pies.

Since I was using frozen berries, I decided to try out the "juice method" for the pie filling that we had learned in class. Instead of just mixing all the ingredients together -- which I normally do! -- you let the fruit defrost and then cook down the juice combined with sugar to create a thick, viscous gel that is then poured over the fruit. The benefits of this method is that the berries are cooked prior to baking and therefore bake for a shorter time which will prevent your crust from over-browning. Also, the filling is thicker and is less likely to run after cooled and cut.

Putting together the pies was a little more...time consuming than I thought. First, you have to roll out the dough -- I suggest using a high quality pie crust due to the high crust to filling ratio, this is the recipe I generally us -- multiple times. Then you have to fill each crust with a bit of filling and top it with another piece of crust. Finally, you have to pinch together the two crusts, cut steam holes in each one, brush with milk and sprinkle with sugar. And repeat with the next batch. Whew!

Even though these mini pies were time consuming, the end result was worth the time. The filling was just the right bit of tartness and the Meyer Lemon brought out the natural sweetness of the raspberry. These little hand-held pies are easy to pack and make the perfect mid-day treat!

Since it seems to be pie week, I want to give a little shout out to local pie maker Kate of Art of the Pie. If you are in the Seattle area and love making pies, I highly suggest signing up for one of Kate's classes through Art of the Pie. She will teach you techniques on making crust, filling, decoration and baking! I took the class a couple years ago and it gave me a new mindset on how to approach pie making.

Happy Saturday, everyone!

Live. Love. Bake.

Raspberry-Lemon Mini Pies
Adapted from The Messy Baker's Raspberry Pie recipe. Yields about 30 mini pies.

Ingredients 

2 1/2 cups frozen raspberries
1 cup water

1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup raspberry juice liquid

2 Tb. cornstarch 
4 Tb. raspberry juice liquid

1/2 cup sugar
Juice of 1/2 a Meyer Lemon
Zest of 1/2 a Meyer Lemon
1 Tb. butter 
Milk and sugar for brushing

1 double-pie crust or any extra pie scraps you have


Method

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. Combine frozen raspberries and water in a large saucepan. Over high heat, heat raspberries just until they are thawed. Place a strainer over a large bowl. Pour thawed raspberries into the strainer and let them strain off the juice.
3. Add the 1/4 cup sugar and 1/2 cup of the raspberry juice liquid to the large saucepan. Over medium-high heat, whisk liquid until the sugar dissolves. Remove from heat.
4. In a small bowl, mix together the cornstarch and raspberry juice liquid until no clumps remain. Add the cornstarch mixture to sauce pan and return heat to medium-high. Whisk continuously until the mixture thickens and becomes viscous. The mixture should not be milky, this means that not all the cornstarch has dissolved. Remove from heat. 
5. Stir in the 1/2 cup sugar, lemon juice, lemon zest and butter. Whisk until the sugar is dissolved. If necessary, put the mixture back over the stove for a few minutes. 
6. Put the drained raspberries into a large bowl. Pour the mixture over the raspberries and lightly fold it into the raspberries. Let the mixture cool completely before filling pies.
7. Roll out your pie dough until about 1/4-inch thick. Using a 3 1/2-inch pastry cutter, cut out an even amount of pieces. Place dough pieces on lined baking sheet.
8. Put about 1 Tb. of filling onto the middle of each piece of dough. Cover the filling with another piece of pie dough. Pinch together the edges using your fingers. If you like, use a fork to press down the edges to create a decorative crust. Cut a few steam holes in the top of each pie.
9. Brush the tops of each mini pie with milk and sprinkle with sugar. Refrigerate for about 5 minutes before baking.
10. Bake the pies for 20 minutes and then rotate 180 degrees. Bake for an additional 20-25 minutes until the tops are golden brown and the filling is bubbling. Let cool completely on wire racks.
11. Repeat steps 7-10 until your dough and/or filling is gone! Enjoy!