As I was saying, I was having a rough day in the kitchen.  Again, in the spirit of not letting my apples go to waste, I wanted to make apple pie.  But apple pie is a pain to cut and serve so I searched the internet for another idea.  I happened across a recipe at Pillsbury for mini blackberry pies.  Why not make them mini apple pies?  They would be easy finger food for adults and all those little monsters running around opening presents.  Not that any of the kids I know ever eat anything on Christmas anyway.  So, I embarked on altering the recipe.  I would post the link, but the Pillsbury website appears to be down at this moment.

1.  Roll out a pie crust (again, I used a premade, I've referenced my pie crust anxiety before) and use a 2 3/4" round cookie cutter and cut as many 'mini crusts' out as possible.  I was able to roll it back out and get 13 out of one crust.  Also, I used a cutter with zig-zag edges for appearance sake.

2.  Spray a mini muffin tin with wd-40 (aka Pam) and put the 'mini crusts' inside.  Press down gently.  Don't do as I did, and form them on the underside of the muffin tins because you thought you read the instructions correctly.  This adds an extra step.

3.  Now the apple filling:

     a.  Dice up 3 cups of apples

     b.  Add apples and other ingredients to a sauce pan except flour (recipe below)

     c.  When the mixture comes to a simmer, sprinkle flour in and stir in.  Allow to simmer, stirring frequently for 15-20 min until soft

     d.  Mash gently (I literally did this only twice just to make sure the chunks of apples were small enough to fit in the cups, don't over mash, we aren't making applesauce)

     e.  Place 1 heaping tablespoon in each

4.  With the remaining pie dough, I cut out little stars and put them on top of the little pies.  I only had enough dough to make a few, but I wasn't going to use a whole crust just for a few stars

5.  Brush stars with egg wash for a nice shine and sprinkle with sugar

6.  Bake at 350 for 12-15 minutes (until crust is golden, the filling is already cooked)

Apple Filling:

3 cups diced apples

1 tbl lemon juice

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/8 tsp nutmeg

2 tbl flour

Make sure, when you are transferring your mini pies to the serving device, your fiance doesn't yell a question at you from the laundry room, causing you to drop any of your pies.  Believe me, it can happen, and before you know it, there is an unsalvageable pie, upside down, on the cat hair covered floor.  No 5 second rule here.