Spiced rum apple hand pies

I was looking forward towards Saturday the whole week because it's the day I usually bake. This whole week has been tiring for me with insufficient amount of sleep, it was a torture. Anyhoo, Leslie came down for a visit! So yeah, I took Leslie and Aimi for breakfast then we went for a short grocery trip to get ingredients for my Spiced Rum Apple Hand Pies.  

Initially, I wanted to make Peach Bourbon Hand Pies (recipe from smitten kitchen) but peaches are out of season right now. So I thought hey why not apple pie instead? I couldn't find the base of my tart mould so I decided to make it into hand pies instead.

I was at Tesco and there were different kinds of red apples. Leslie was telling which apple was the gritty, sandy feeling. I HATE THOSE KIND OF APPLES by the way because it feels like I'm taking a bite into dried up sponge. So I decided to buy 2 kinds of red apples for my pie, Fuji & Royal Gala.

Leslie and Aimi helped me cut the red apples, it was so great to catch up with them. It's been a year since I've last seen these two ever since Leslie went back to Sabah.

All peeled and ready to be sliced! I used a mixture of both apples because I don't want my apple hand pies to be just a sweet dessert. I always think it is better if there's like a mixture of a little bit of sour apples in this. 

I bought normal rum, so I spiced it up with some cloves, ground nutmeg and some ground cinnamon. A little bit of spice won't hurt no body ;) I sliced some apples to make compote, only this time my compote wasn't savoury. The last time I made savoury compote to accompany my pork burgers. 

I mixed fresh diced apples to my compote as my filling so there's a little bit of crunch to it.

I browned my butter so give it a little nutty flavour, I guess it my head it all goes well together. The rum, the spices, the apples and the brown butter. Oh yum! After I browned my butter I added in the cloves then apples! 

While my compote was simmering, Leslie and Aimi helped me with dicing of the apples. They marinated it in rum and some orange peel. Oh, it smells good!

We just realise we added rum everywhere! And no you won't get drunk having this. Don't worry. I had a few and I am still fine hahah.

Compote yourself away apples!

Wished my kitchen had an air-cond because the weather was so warm that my butter melted quite fast and I didn't even use my hands to mix the butter and flour together.

Pouring in the sour cream mixture into the bowl of flour and butter. Remember to cut your finger nails short or it's just nasty to get dough under your nails. Also, it will be hard to clean it and eventually you have to cut your fingernails.

The dough! It was so soft like a sugar dough ( dough that is usually used in fruit tarts ) I thought I added too much of liquid and I was really afraid of over working the dough. So I wrapped that up in cling film and leave it in the fridge to let it rest before I start rolling it out.

Marinated diced apples + apple compote :D

I continued on today because we went out for dinner last night. So I took out the dough and rolled it out quite thin, thickness of a 20 cent coin? Well at least, I tried to get it all with that thickness. 

Roll 'em and cut 'em with a ring cutter. Alternatively, you could use a medium sized jam jar. :D

I had to work really fast with this dough because it was so soft. After rolling it, I popped it right back into the fridge for a while till it slightly hardens. 

Then spoon up some of that filling and placed it in the corner. The ones I did above had too much of filling, so I reduced it a little before I close them up. 

It's like making baked curry puffs. LOL

I think if I never told anyone what I was making, they'll assume I'm baking baked curry puffs. The spiced rum apple hand pies were baked at 190 degrees celsius. 

Oh ya, I tested the pastry. I actually had a bigger piece to cut it BUT HUN ATE IT! when I told him not to -.- So the pastry looks like this! I was so amaze, I was like wow! okay it looks like 

puff pastry! Because of the layer/hollowness? 

Test, test it wasn't a failure woohoo! I was happy with the end product, it's just that I think made way too much of filling and very little dough. I decided to make an Apple Crumble with the remaining filling because my mom was hinting me to do so and there you go, no wastage :D

Rustic apples hand pies. Cheh....rustic.

For the filling:

Green apples

Fuji Red apples

Royal Gala Red apples

Cloves (just a few)

1/8 teaspoon Ground Cinnamon

1/16 teaspoon Ground Nutmeg

4 Tablespoon of Rum

6 Tablespoon of Brown Sugar 

Butter

Honestly, I adjusted the flavours and the sweetness along the way.

For the pastry (I took it from Smitten Kitchen):

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 tsp. salt

16 tablespoons (2 sticks, 8 ounces) unsalted butter, cut into pieces

1/2 cup sour cream

4 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

1/2 cup ice water 

Well, that sums up my weekend! :)