apple & sage hand pies

The other night I made these complete delicious and savory little hand pies for dinner.  It was a really simple recipe, with a list of basic ingredients that I really loved.  Darrell took a few leftovers for his lunch and said they were equally yummy served cold.  I found the recipe here, made a few edits, and was glad to find that it was very easily made vegan, although feel free to make it in its original vegetarian version!  

flaky pastry crust (adapted from mark bittman):

1 stick cold butter (use earth balance for vegan version)
1 cup all-purpose flour, plus a few tablespoons for rolling the dough (i swapped in 1/2 c. whole wheat)
1/2 teaspoon salt (or so)
1 teaspoon sugar (or so)
3 or more cold tablespoons of water
1/2 cup or so grated extra sharp cheddar cheese (daiya cheddar shreds were my substitute)
a small handful or so of fresh sage, chopped

for the filling:

3 smallish apples, preferably red - the granny smith can get too tart
a few tablespoons flour
a few tablesoons sugar
juice of one lemon
one small bunch sage, chopped
five slices yellow onion, quartered
one slice extra sharp cheddar cheese per pie (i sliced pieces off a daiya cheddar block)


for the crust:
mix together dry ingredients then use a pastry blender, fork, or hulking food processor to mix butter and cheese into flour until the mixture looks like crumbs. form dough with hands by adding cold water to your crumbs, one tablespoon at a time. when formed into a ball, wrap in parchment paper and refrigerate for ten minutes while you prepare the filling. when you're ready, dump PLENTY of flour onto your surface and rolling pin and flatten away. You'll have to keep reshaping it out to cut small pie crust half-moons.

slice the apples nice and thin.  after slicing, douse apples with the juice of 1/2 a lemon. mix a few tablespoons sugar and flour into slices. add chopped fresh sage and a few slices of onion, quartered. spoon mixture onto your dough rounds (not too much!) and top with a slice of cheddar cheese. fold dough round in half over the filling and pinch shut (using a fork to tamp down the edges works well). place hand pies on a parchment covered cookie sheet and bake at 450 F for about 20 minutes, or until nicely browned.