I have nothing but respect for the makers and bakers of hand pie. Truly. Respect. I have only attempted hand-pies a few times because my previous experiences with them were a mess. And baking messes, when I have them, result in waves of cursing in the kitchen, which my poor partner patiently endures and then waits the appropriate, oh, ten minutes or so, before gently asking if he can help. This is also the reason why slab pie has been banned from our home — at least for a few more months.

Given the history of hand pies in our kitchen, including one batch that was accidentally made with gluten-free flour, I have a bit of a complex about them now. I start out with a fear that it’s going to be a trial baking them, and then my hands feel giant and unequipped to deal with pint-size pies, so I usually give the whole process a few minutes of thought before deciding to make a standard-size pie for the masses.

Ok. All that said. I received an incredibly generous tool months ago from Bee Loomis, intended for dumplings, I think? Or empanadas? But knowing my love for pie she recognized the potential that it would work equally well for hand-held pie. As a side note, Bee is secretly a master of pie, but she sweetly and modestly won’t fess up to it in person. I was, however, lucky enough to taste one of her cherry pies last fall in Kansas.

Never being one to quiver in the face of a challenge for long, and because I’m also feeling ready to dive whole-heartedly into pie-practice again — it’s stone fruit season and SUMMER in the bay area — I decided to give peanut butter-cherry hand pies a whirl, and, you guys, breathe easy, they taste amazing.

They don’t look amazing . . . yet. This is part of pie practice. They look like, I dunno, sad, sad empanadas. But the process was transformed thanks to my new tool and pretty darn pleasant. So there’s only room for the finished product to improve.

If imperfect pie happens to you, too, I invite you to subscribe to my pie theory, which is — imperfection is actually the guise of perfection. Even if a pie doesn’t look super, if you haven’t overworked your dough and the filling is not wrong (like the bourbon-pumpkin pie I made one Thanksgiving that was inexplicably terrible), it will ALWAYS taste amazing. Ok, nine times out of ten. Even if the crust cracks or the filling overflows the pie shell, serve it to your friends, your family, and I bet they’ll be happy. And when it’s sliced up and on a plate, no one will know the difference. 

This is a warm and nostalgia-inducing take on the classic PB&J sandwich, in pie form. Peanut butter-cherry hand pies would also be delicious by swapping out the cherries for your favorite jam or jelly.

 

Pie dough:

Your favorite recipe for a double-crust pie, or, my favorite:

2 ½ cups all-purpose or pastry flour, plus extra for dusting

1 tbsp. Granulated sugar

1 tsp. Kosher or table salt

2 sticks unsalted butter

½ cup ice water

Filling:

1 cup all-natural peanut butter — creamy or nutty, your choice

1 ½ cups fresh cherries, halved and tossed with 1-2 tbs. sugar

Notes:

— An egg wash around the edges of each circle of dough helps the pies seal together when assembling. For the egg wash, I used 1 egg mixed with 1 tbsp. cold water.
— If you’re using jam instead of a fresh fruit filling, ¾ cup to 1 cup of jam should be plenty.

Bake at 375˚F on parchment-lined baking sheets for 15-20 minutes, or until golden brown.