Guess what the date is this Friday? Friday the 13th! If you haven’t checked your calendar yet, next month also boasts a Friday the 13th. Two in a row! Growing up, this was a day guaranteed to air marathons of the films on cable. Some years, you could find marathons of the television series. Those marathons seemed to have waned over the years; I’ve checked my cable guide and can’t find a single showing on basic cable this Friday. Instead, I’ll force my boxed set upon my poor friends. To compensate, I’ll bring along personal sized cherry pie.
Things you’ll need:
2 (2 count) packages of refrigerated pie crusts
4 cups of red pie filling (cherry, strawberry rhubarb, etc)
1 egg, whisked
Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 350F degrees. Grease 12 muffin cups.
2. Flour your work space. Roll out a single pie crust (keep rest of pie crust in fridge until ready to use). Use a four-inch, round cookie cutter to cut out circle of dough. Don’t have this? Neither do I. I used a lid of a yogurt container. Press each circle of dough into the bottom of each muffin cup so that a little rim of dough sticks out of the top. Repeat until all 12 cups are filled.
3. Fill each cup with pie filling, approx 1/4 cup, until nearly filled.
4. Here’s the creative part. Topping the pie. Roll out the remaining dough. To make the Jason Voorhees hockey mask: I don’t have a miniature oval or circle cookie cutter, so I took a small spoon and traced the shape with a knife. Then used the knife to cut out the eye holes. For smaller holes I just pressed down with the knife and gave a small twist, following the shape in the mask as much as possible with the small dough canvas. A cookie cutter I’m sure would have given a much cleaner appearance, as would using something like a straw for the eyes. But, you make do with what you have, right? Place pieces on top of filling. You can cut out any shape you wish or even make a small lattice. I attempted a machete, but it never quite worked out how I wished.
5. Use a pastry brush to brush the tops of each pie with the whisked egg. Then bake for 25-30 minutes, or until the filling begins to bubble and the crust is lightly golden.
6. Remove from oven and let cool in pan for at least 15 minutes. Then gently lift out each pie from muffin tin. If it doesn’t give as easily, carefully run a knife around the edges of each pie to loosen before removing from tin. Serve immediately or cover and refrigerate.
Happy Friday the 13th!
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