Salted Caramel Apple Pies

Posted by CK in apple, caramel, pie, recipe

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We were having some friends over for a fondue the other day. I had the meal aaaaaall figured out: we were going to have a variety of meats, shrimp, veggies, as well as some cheese and black olives to roll the meat around (if you've never tried this - it's a MUST. Melted cheese inside your meat...absolutely delicious!!).

For dessert, I was planning my usual Toblerone chocolate fondue - until I remembered that one of our guests was allergic to nuts! I had to come up with SOMETHING since most chocolate contains nuts and I wasn't sure which kind he was able to have. So, I pulled out a pie recipe that I found at Just a Taste and adjusted it slighty.

Admittedly, it was a long process to make the individual pies, but the result was definitely worth it!!

Ingredients
For the dough

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
  
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into cubes
• 1/2 cup cold sour cream

For the filling

• 2 cups small diced granny smith apples (peeling is optional) - they shouldn't be bigger than corn kernels
• 2 tsp lemon juice
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/8 cup sugar
• 2 tsp all-purpose flour
• store-bought caramels, cut in half (the ones you get on Halloween work perfectly)
• Salt
• Egg wash (1 lighty whisked egg + 1 tsp water)

Make the dough

1. Whisk together the flour, salt and baking powder in a large bowl
2. Add the cubed butter to the bowl and use your fingers to work the butter into the flour until the mixture feels like wet sand
3. Add the sour cream and knead the dough a few times until it comes together adding more flour (1 tsp at a time) if it's too sticky, and more sour cream (1 tsp at a time) if it's too dry.
4. Roll the dough into a rectangle and dust both sides with flour. Fold it in thirds, rotate the dough 90 degrees and roll it our into a rectangle again. Do this 2 more times. 
5. On your last fold, wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes while you make the filling.

Make the filling

1. In a small bowl, combine the apples, lemon juice, cinnamon, sugar and flour, stirring until mixed.

Assemble the pies

1. Preheat the oven to 425 F
2. Remove the dough from the fridge and roll it out to about a half inch. 
3. Using a cookie cutter, cut out pairs of circles into your dough and place half the pair onto a parchment paper-lined cookie sheet. Make sure you end up with an even number of pies. 
4. Add filling to the circle that's on the cookie sheet and top with a piece of caramel. cover with the second circle and crimp the sides together with a fork
5. with a sharp knife, cut two or three vents on top of each pie.
6. Bake the pies for approximately 15 minutes, or until they're golden brown

Enjoy!

- CK