These pumpkin hand pies start with a homemade pie dough, are filled with a simple pumpkin pie filling, and finished with a sweet maple glaze. Easily portable personal pumpkin pies with extra flaky crust… what could be better? Like my apple hand pies and chocolate pastry tarts, this is a fun baking project you can absolutely handle.
How do I love thee, pumpkin pie, let me count the ways: there’s my favorite classic pumpkin pie; a large pumpkin slab pie; bite-size mini pumpkin pies; oh, and easier-than-pie pumpkin pie bars… but today I have a new variation on this favorite fall theme to share with you: pumpkin hand pies!
Because what’s more fun than a homemade, individually portioned pie just for you, no sharing required? It’s one of the many things I love about apple hand pies, after all. Here are some more reasons to add pumpkin hand pies to your fall dessert repertoire:
Plus, pumpkin hand pies give you more crust than filling in every bite. So if you love mega flaky buttery pie crust and the flavor of pumpkin pie (but don’t absolutely love the texture), this is the perfect solution.
First step is to make your pie dough. Because there’s a higher crust-to-filling ratio in hand pies, we want a crust that tastes GOOD.
I recommend using my all-butter pie crust for exceptional flavor and flake. It’s the same crust I use when I make these homemade brown sugar cinnamon pop-tarts. The recipe yields 2 crusts, and you’ll use both in this recipe to produce 12–16 hand pies.
Can I use store-bought pre-made pie dough instead? You absolutely can, but the crust may not be quite as thick and flaky, or as flavorful. You need 2 pie crusts, as if you were making 2 single-crust pies.
You need just a bowl and a whisk to make the pumpkin hand pie filling—no mixer required. Whisk together:
You don’t need a special cookie cutter to make these pretty half-moon-shaped pumpkin pies. Simply place a bowl that is about 5 inches diameter, give or take, upside down on your rolled-out pie dough and cut around it with a knife. Easy, right? If you don’t have a bowl this size, cut a 5-inch circle from a piece of paper.
You’ll need to re-roll the scraps a few times to use up all the dough, just like we do when cutting out sugar cookies.
After I cut the dough into circles, I pile the circles onto a plate and refrigerate for about 15 minutes. Remember what I said above? The colder the pie dough is, the easier it is to work with.
Then it’s time to fill the hand pies.
Spoon just about 1.5–2 Tablespoons of the filling onto one half of each circle, leaving a border around the edge. Fold the circle in half over the filling, then crimp the pie crust edges with a fork to seal.
Use a sharp knife to cut a couple slits in the top of each hand pie to vent steam during baking. Finally, brush with a little egg wash to help the crusts brown and develop that pretty shine.
You can shape the hand pies however you want. I use a 3.5-inch round cookie cutter to make my apple hand pies. You can use a similarly sized pumpkin-shaped cookie cutter, such as this one.
You could also shape into rectangles.. I use a ruler and a pizza cutter and cut the dough into 3×4-inch rectangles. Bake time will be more or less depending on size—just bake until the crust is golden brown.
This simple maple glaze is the icing on the… hand pie. It’s a flavorful finishing touch everyone loves. To make it, you need: confectioners’ sugar, pure maple syrup, milk, a pinch of salt, and either maple or vanilla extract. If you’ve made these reader-favorite maple brown sugar cookies before, you probably have some maple extract in your kitchen! But if you can’t find it, or simply want a more subtle maple flavor, you can use vanilla extract instead.
And if you don’t love the flavor combo of maple mingling with pumpkin, feel free to use a plain vanilla icing or the cinnamon icing from these homemade pop tarts instead.
Once the pumpkin hand pies are cool enough to handle, you can dip them in the glaze. The glaze sets in about 1 hour.
These pumpkin hand pies start with a homemade pie dough, are filled with a simple pumpkin pie filling, and finished with a sweet maple glaze that sets. Use homemade pie crust for best flavor, or choose store-bought pie dough for a shortcut..
