”You have to taste a culture to understand it.”

– Deborah Cater

Small meat pies with buttery dough

These small meat pies are made with a simple and easy buttery dough. The dough does not have any yeast, baking powder or baking soda in it. The baked pies have thin, crispy, and a bit layered crust. Using this dough you can make and bake small home made pies from scratch with different – sweet and savoury – fillings.

Step by step baking tutorial
Serving Size:
Makes about 30
Time:
Prep time: 1.5h
Wait time: 1 h
Bake time: 15 min per tray
Difficulty:
Medium

Ingredients

For the dough:
  • 250 – 300 g (2 cups) all-purpose flour
  • 200 g (0.85 cups) unsalted butter (room temperature)
  • 125 g (1/2 cup) sour cream or plain greek yoghurt
  • 1 egg
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1 egg for brushing the pies
For the filling:
  • 300 g ground meat
  • 1 medium size onion
  • 3 garlic cloves
  • 1 carrot
  • 2 tsp tomato paste
  • salt and black pepper

Directions

  1. To make the dough mix in a bowl all-purpose flour, butter, sour cream or yoghurt, salt and an egg. Knead it until you have a soft dough ball, which does not stick to hands. If the dough is too sticky, add a tablespoon of flour at a time, not to add too much flour. When the dough is ready, cover the bowl and put it in the fridge for about an hour or till you are ready to bake.
  2. To make the filling, peel and grate the carrot and cut onion in small cubes. Press or chop the garlic cloves.
  3. Put some cooking oil in a frying pan and heat the pan on the stove. Put the meat to fry. As the meat is frying, stir it occasionally, add about a teaspoon of salt and 1/2 tsp of black pepper.
  4. When the meat has cooked for a bit, add and stir in the carrot, onion and garlic. Let them cook for another 5 minutes.
  5. Add about 120 ml of water and tomato paste. Mix everything, turn the heat to medium low and let everything simmer till the water is gone and the meat is soft and juicy. Put the meat in a bowl and let it cool as we need to use it cool for the filling of pies.
  6. Set the oven to heat to 220° C or 430° F.
  7. Put a piece of parchment paper or a silicone baking mat in a baking tray and dust with a bit of flour. Dust also the kitchen countertop with some flour and the rolling pin.
  8. Roll the dough thin, a few millimetres. The dough is very soft, so it does not need to be pushed much when rolling. You can roll all the dough at once or cut a piece at a time. Keep the dough you are not working with in the fridge.
  9. Put about 2 teaspoons of the meat filling a few centimetres from the edge of the rolled dough. Fold the dough over the filling, press the dough around the filling lightly with fingers and cut out a pie with the help of a glass or a cup in a shape of half of a circle. To be on the safe side and prevent the pie from opening when it’s baking, you can pinch the sides of the pie closed with fingers.
  10. Arrange the pies on a baking tray leaving a little gap between them.
  11. Break an egg in a glass and whisk it a little with a fork. Brush all the pies with the egg before putting them in the oven.
  12. Bake the small meat pies for about 10 – 15 minutes till they look golden brown.
  13. Remove from the oven, let them cool in the baking tray for a few minutes before moving them and enjoy!

Notes

  • For best results, measure ingredients with a scale. All recipes are made with weighed ingredients using grams. Cup measurements are provided for your convenience.