Sweet as Pie

I am so so so excited that it is fall. I love everything about it, the cooler weather, pumpkin everything, and baking. Especially baking. The other night while the Mr. was at class, the girls and I decided to bake mini pies, or tarts or I don't know what their technical term is. But they were good. Damn good. I've never made a pie crust from scratch before, always just went for the pre-made store bought kind because I'm kind of lazy. But I learned 2 things from making it from scratch: 1. it's really not that hard, and 2. it makes a world of difference. It's WAY better than the store bought kind. (ok I lied I learned one more thing) 3. there's sour cream in pie crust (at least the kind I made) did you know that? Isn't that weird? No? Well I was kind of nervous to eat it, because all I could think in my head was sour cream, sour cream, sour cream. But it totally blew my mind. It was that good.

This is Bakerella's version. Do you know Bakerella? She's amazeballs. She's the inventor of Cakepops. I don't know how she does it. The woman has the patience of a saint to sit there and decorate all those cakepops so perfectly. Anywho, it's her recipe that I adapted, that she adapted from someone else's recipe. So I'm not quite sure where it originated. Her's are in super cute heart shapes, but I was just lucky to get mine not to fall apart.

STORE LIST:

2 C flour

1/3 C sug

3/4 C cold butter cubed

2 egg yolks

1/4 C sour cream

3 Tbs ice cold water

-

2/3 C sug

1/4 C flour

1 Tbs lemon juice

-

6 C berries (any combo of blueberries/blackberries/raspberries etc)

1 egg

sug

The original directions told me to put the 2 C flour and 1/3 C sug in a food processor adding in the cubed butter or to use a pastry cutter to cut in the butter. But my food processor is very teeny, and I don't have a pastry cutter. So I improvised and used forks. Totally worked just the same. In a small bowl stir egg yolks, sour cream and water together. Gracen got a real kick out of this step. She was watching me try to just get the egg yolks, and one or two might've slipped down the drain. Those suckers are slippery! Stir that into the flour mixture. Knead the dough until a ball forms. Cover with plastic wrap, pat into a disc and refrigerate for an hour. I should've put mine in the freezer, because an hour in the fridge was not nearly long enough, and I was too impatient to wait longer. So mine got an hour in the fridge and maybe 10 minutes in the freezer before it was go time, and it could've used at least 10 more minutes in the freezer, but we all know patience is not my strong suit. Pre-heat oven to 400. Split dough into 10 even portions. Um yea, I didn't do that since I only had about half the fruit. So I split my dough in half and put the other half back in the fridge to use for something else. I split mine into 4 sections, and rolled them out on a floured surface. They weren't the prettiest to look at, but they were also still very sticky since they didn't sit in the fridge long enough, and it really didn't matter how pretty they looked. My kitchen is non-judgmental. After they were rolled out I placed them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper (hello easy cleanup!). Combine the 2/3 C sug and 1/4 C flour in a bowl, sprinkle a bit in each dough circle. In a larger bowl combine fruit, lemon juice and remaining sug/flour mixture. I used frozen mixed fruit from a bag and it only had about 3 C in it, which is why I only used half the dough. The mixed fruit had strawberries, cherries, blackberries, blueberries and raspberries. D-lish. Spoon the fruit mixture (covered in flour/sug and lemon juice) onto the center of each tartlett (who doesn't love a tartlett?). Fold edges of dough over fruit overlapping the dough as you go. Yea I just kind of pinched it together so that the fruit juices wouldn't overflow, again I wasn't worried about looks. It's what's on the inside that counts. Brush the dough with egg and sprinkle sug on edges. Bake for 20 minutes or until edges are golden brown. 

Sorry for the poor lighting, camera phone, and late at night does not a good picture make.

Then eat. With ice cream. Right out of the oven. You'll never be the same. They were so good. I'm sad they're gone. The girls and I split one, and the Mr. ate 2. That's how good they are. And pretty darn easy to make. Next time I'll probably make the dough the night before so that I'm sure it's nice and firm and easy to roll out, but you better believe that this just became a fall staple in my house. The best part is you can use any kind of fruit, and totally adapt this to your tastes. And turns out, sour cream makes a pretty damn good pie crust.