Heart Shaped Strawberry Pies

Heart Shaped Strawberry Pies are a cute way to give a homemade Valentine’s Day sweet from the ‘heart’ to the ones you love. This can even be a project that you can do together as a family.

Prep Time:35 minutes                           Cook Time: 25 minutes

Ingredients

1 Pie Crust Dough

2 Cups Strawberries,  diced very small

2 Tablespoons Sugar

2 Teaspoons Corn Starch

Flour (for rolling out crusts)

1 Eggs, lightly beaten

Nutella, optional but “Hey Why Not?”

Sanding Sugar, to dust on top of pies

Icing Option:

1/2 Cup Confectioners Sugar

1-2 Teaspoons Milk

Directions

1. Combine strawberries, sugar, and starch in a medium bowl. Stir to combine.
2. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees F. Cover a large baking sheet with parchment paper (or aluminum foil with a light coat of non-stick spray)
3. Lightly dust a large flat surface for rolling out your dough with flour. Add your pie crust. Rub flour on rolling pin. Roll pie crust out to a pretty thin level (between ¼ – ⅛ inch thick), turning dough as you go so it doesn’t stick. Use a 2½” heart-shaped cookie cutter to cut out 20 heart-shaped pieces of dough. More if you have left over dough. Feel free to use whichever size you prefer.
4. Move half of the pieces of pie dough to the prepared baking sheet. For each mini pie: Brush dough with egg wash, top with strawberry mixture (try to avoid adding liquid as you go), add about ½-1 teaspoon of nutella if using, top with another piece of dough, matching edges and pressing to seal. Press on the edges with the ends of a fork to help seal. Repeat for the rest of the mini pies.
5. Cut small slits into the tops of each mini pie, brush with egg wash, and sprinkle with sanding sugar.
6. Bake pies for 22-24 minutes or until tops are golden brown.
7. Allow pies to cool before eating or add a scoop of ice cream or cool whip if you prefer to eat them warm.

Optional icing step: If you don’t use nutella, you’ll probably want to add a bit of icing.  Just whisk quickly the confectioner’s sugar and milk (starting with about 1 teaspoon of the milk and adding more as needed) in a bowl and drizzled over the cooled mini pies.