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These cranberry hand pies are made with a homemade pie crust (or store-bought for an even quicker dessert!) and packed with an orange-scented cranberry filling. This is the perfect sweet and tart dessert!
Do you need the cutest and most festive holiday dessert? Why not try these adorable little cranberry hand pies?!
They are packed with orange-scented cranberry sauce and wrapped in a quick homemade sour cream pie crust pastry.
To make them extra special, I cut them out with Christmas tree-shaped cookie cutters, but you could use whatever shape cutters you have on hand.
This is also an excellent use for any leftover cranberry sauce you have on hand.
The whole family will love this simple, sweet, tart holiday treat! Oh, and don’t skip that orange glaze for the top. It sends it right over the top!
Ingredients needed
- Fresh cranberries
- Granulated sugar
- Orange juice
- Orange zest
- Vanilla extract
- Homemade sour cream pastry
- Coarse sugar
- Powdered sugar
- Orange juice
Making hand pies quicker
While making homemade cranberry hand pies isn’t hard, it does take a bit of time to make the sauce, let it cool, and then make the pastry.
One option is to make the dough and cranberry sauce the night before and let both chill in the fridge until you’re ready to assemble and cut out your pies.
Other options are to use store-bought pie dough or canned whole-berry cranberry sauce. Both of these options will reduce cooking and prep time.
If you use store-bought pie dough, use the dough that rolls out in the refrigerated section. You’ll likely need at least two sheets of dough. The size of your cookie cutter and the size you want your hand pies to be will determine this.
Using store-bought cranberry sauce is simple, but grab whole-berry cranberry sauce. It is the closest to homemade and will have a better taste and texture than jellied cranberry sauce.
FAQ’s
Serving hand pies
The joy of a hand pie is that it ticks all the dessert boxes—flakey crust, yummy filling, and sweet drizzled glaze.
In my opinion, it’s the dessert that has it all in a fun handheld form.
For my family, I serve them alongside coffee or whatever after-dinner drink my family craves.
If you’re looking at me, I might pair it with some aged eggnog.
Storage and leftovers
I like to store them in an airtight container and eat them within 3 days.
If you want to crisp the pastry back up, you can pop it into an oven or toaster oven for a few minutes.
More cranberry recipes
Cranberry Hand Pies
Ingredients
For cranberry filling:
- 12 ounces fresh or frozen cranberries
- ¾ cup orange juice, freshly squeezed
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- 1 tablespoon orange zest
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Pie dough:
- 2⅓ cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 cup unsalted butter, cold and cubed
- ½ cup full-fat sour cream, plus more if needed
- 1 large egg, beaten
For assembly:
- 2 tablespoons water
- 1 large egg, beaten
- ⅓ cup course sugar
For orange glaze:
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 2-3 tablespoons orange juice
Instructions
For cranberry filling:
- Combine all the ingredients except vanilla in a small saucepan.
- Cook over medium-high heat for about 25 minutes or until the berries have popped and cooked down into a thick jelly-like consistency. If the mixture is bubbling too much turn the heat down and continue cooking until thickened.
- Add vanilla, stir and leave it to cool to room temperature. As the mixture cools it will also thicken.
For the pie dough:
- Take the butter from the fridge, cut it into cubes and let it sit for a few minutes.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and sugar.
- Add in the cubed butter and toss.
- Using a pastry blender, work the butter into the flour until you're left with pea-sized lumps of butter.
- Add the sour cream and using a fork incorporate it into the mixture.
- Dump the dough onto a lightly floured surface and bring it together with a few quick kneads until you get a smooth ball, consistency of a Play-Doh – don't worry about over-working this dough.
- Split the dough in half, press each half into a disk and wrap tightly with plastic wrap.
- Once the dough is wrapped into plastic, using a rolling pin, roll it over the dough to close any cracks.
- Refrigerate for at least 2 hours.
For assembly and baking:
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F and line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Take one half of the dough from the fridge and let it rest on the counter for 10-15 minutes, it will be easier to roll out.
- Lightly flour the work surface and the rolling pin, and roll out the dough to about 1/8-inch thick.
- Using a larger tree cookie cutter (mine was 5 inches high and 3.5 inches wide), you can use a star-shaped, or simple round cookie cutter if desired), cut out as many trees from the dough as you can.
- Re-roll any scraps of dough and cut more.
- On half of the cut trees, put about 1-2 teaspoons of filling straight through the middle (make sure the filling is not all over the edges), brush a little bit of water along the edges, then press all around the edge with your fingertips to seal then use a fork to crimp.
- Poke each pie 3-4 times in the middle with a toothpick, brush with beaten egg and sprinkle with coarse sugar.
- Bake for 18-20 minutes (depending on the size of the pie itself), or until golden brown.
- Repeat the process with the other half of the dough and the filling.
For orange glaze:
- In a small bowl add powdered sugar and orange juice and whisk to combine.
- If you want a thinner glaze add in more orange juice. If you want a thicker glaze add in more powdered sugar.
- Drizzle over the cooled hand pies.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
