In my Roasted Eggplant Caponata with Brown Butter Pasta post last week, I promised you a recipe that will make the Caponata taste even better! Without further ado, here it is. It’s a simple equation and it goes like this,
Caponata + Cheese + Puff Pastry = Delicious Roasted Eggplant Caponata and Cheese Hand pies!
I love savoury pies. But do you know what’s better than one big delicious pie? Smaller, delicious individual hand pies of course! Growing up, my little sister and I would often have harmless sibling squabbles for equal portions of food. A far too common question during our dinners was “how much did you take?”. There were times when I did use my big sister card and get away with slightly bigger portions, but those times became few and far between as my sister grew up. One trick my mum often used to solve this delicate problem was to make smaller individual portions. Oh, how she would have loved the idea of these little hand pies back then!
To me, there is something truly adorable about small round hand pies. I love the feel and look of them and for some bizarre reason, making them reminds of old Victorian era kitchens! (yes, I’m as nonplussed about it as you are). Maybe it’s the dusted flour surfaces, or the pastry scraps on the kitchen counter, or the crimping with a fork. Or maybe there’s Victorian blood in me that no one ever told me about. Ummm, on second thought, I doubt it very much. Regardless, making these hand pies is very therapeutic to me!
A few years ago my cousin took me on a visit to a House Museum called Elizabeth Farms in Sydney, Australia which was first built in the early 1800s. It was a beautiful house, and quite naturally it was the kitchen that I fell in love with. I loved the ceramic utensils and the old fashioned fire place. The only picture of that kitchen I have now is this blurry one you see below.
And this is the kind of kitchen I picture in my head now when I make hand pies. Not really sure what to make of that. 🙂
When I was making these, I added less cheese for the first few hand pies, and then more for the last few. Not surprisingly, I preferred the ones with more cheese. Adding a slice of cheese instead of grated might also be a good choice.
If you’d like to make them look more uniform in size, you could use a cutter to cut out perfect circles after crimping the edges.
- 1 heaped cup of Roasted Eggplant Caponata
- 2 sheets of puff pastry from the fridge (should be thawed out in the fridge, overnight)
- OR you can make a quick version from scratch (Rough Puff Pastry) here
- 11 - 1 inch x 1 inch thick slices OR 2 tbsp of grated mozzarella or provolone cheese
- 5 - 6 big basil leaves
- 2.5 - 3 inch round pastry cutter
- 1 egg
- Water to seal the pastry and a fork for crimping
- On a lightly floured surface, cut 9 circles from each puff pastry sheet. Take the scraps and form a ball, rest for 30 minutes and re-roll and cut another 4 circles.
- While that dough is resting, place a heaped tablespoon of caponata in the center of 9 of the pastry circles that you already cut. Rip the basil leaves and place a few pieces on top of the caponata. Then place 1 slice or 2 tbsp of grated cheese on top of this.
- Brush some water along the edge of the pastry circle and gently stretch another puff pastry circle on top of the filling, using your fingers to press and seal the edges. Use a fork to crimp the edges and seal them properly.
- Do this for all the other pastry circles.
- Repeat this for the pastry circles from the re-rolled pastry as well.
- Place the pies on the prepared baking sheet. Using a fork, lightly mix the egg in a small bowl and brush the tops of the hand pies with egg wash.
- Bake in a pre-heated oven for 20 - 30 minutes or until the pastry turns golden brown.
- Remove from the oven, let the pies cool down for about 5 minutes on the tray.
- Serve while warm.
There are some things that look absolutely perfect when it comes to food. Melted, shiny chocolate, bread that is soft on the inside and crusty on the outside, perfectly made espresso (oh that crema!) and of course melted cheese on just about anything. The melted cheese oozing out of these pies is no different. You could of course add more cheese if you like more gooeyness. And less cheese for less gooeyness (although the sound of less cheese makes me incredibly sad! 🙁 )
And how could you forget the crispy, buttery flakes of the puff pastry! The spicy, smoky, tangy, fruity flavours of the caponata and the creamy, gooey melted cheese are perfect inside a buttery pastry. And the addition of the basil leaves rounds off all the flavours with a lovely earthy freshness.
These would be perfect as mini appetizers and for parties, but my husband and I had it for dinner with a salad on the side. We divided the pies “evenly” between us (which is 70:30 in his favour. Not kidding, that’s how it works in our house now. Something tells me that all those times I pulled a fast one on my sister when we were trying to divide food between us when we were younger are coming back to bite me in the rear now). It was a week where we followed up the roasted eggplant caponata and brown butter pasta with these delicious caponata and cheese hand pies and my husband is still having a hard time believing how much he enjoyed two meatless meals on consecutive nights!
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Even though I already commented on these last year I have to say that this caponata is amazing and will be making it again for game day 2017!! And I am happy to say that this is how we met and I am so glad that I made a friend and blog buddy for life!!
Eggplant, cheese, and I can eat it on the go? This day just got a little better;p
Dini,
These hand pies look simply awesome! I love roasted eggplant and this caponata, cheese and the puff pastry look perfect together!
Love pies too!! Yum! Look delicious!
I so love eggplant; this is yet another way to prepare one of my favourite veggies. Thank you for bringing this to Fiesta Friday. Caponata pies, here I come!
This is brilliant. I love Eggplants in almost anything but so far i did not make hand pies with it .. this is the motivation i needed 🙂
I am obsessed with hand pies- these sound (& look!) amazing! Your photos make my mouth water!
I love that one excited drooling pie in that pic. That’s mine Dini 😉
What a clever way to use up leftovers! And I agree, against all odds it does seem you’ve made the caponata even more appealing!! And those hand pies are so cute and delicate 🙂
Maybe I should just hang out in your kitchen!! Everything you make looks so wonderful! I have bookmarked this recipe too! 😀
Wow, you brought something sweet and something savory to Fiesta Friday! Love the sounds of these hand pies, Dini, and they look delectable!
Oh my gosh that ooey gooey cheese is calling my name! I love hand pies and they’ve been on my list to make for awhile now. These are convincing me I need to up them on my list!! 😀
Wow just love these too….puff pastry is to die for isn’t it? I usually use it to make something similar, but in a semi-circle, I like the circular ones, they give it a nice finish Bookmarking this for sure. This recipe did not come up in my feed either, something wierd going on here 🙂
Thank you Loretta! I agree… Puff pastry is to die for! Absolutely love it! (I love baking the scraps and just eating them!)
I’m not sure what’s happening with the feed either… I have to find out how it works… (I’m still learning about how wordpress works)
Another amazing recipe! Love the photos as well! I’m very glad to discover your blog!
Thank you Margy! I am so glad that you like my blog 😀
These look gorgeous, such a nice idea to use up caponata as well. I love the perfect little circles and that gooey cheese coming out…I wish I could have some now!
Thank you Caroline! I have a preference for circle pies, but I don’t discriminate! 😀
Cheesy, gooey, yumminess 😀 Wow those look so tasty!!!
These hand pies are adorable! This is such a great way to use eggplant.
You’re killing me with these great eggplant recipes!! I can’t wait to make these for game-time chowing down!
They would be perfect for Game time!! Now I know what I’ll be making too… hahaha!! Thank you Jennifer!
What an awesome idea for leftovers, they look soooo good! And your photos are gorgeous Dini!
When we were kids me and my sisters definitely had to have everything equal, but I was happy having smaller food portions (I make up the lack of appetite I had as a kid these days though)
They are Michelle! I like making little hand pies out of leftovers! Plus adding cheese makes most things taste even better 🙂
My sister no longer has to fight for the big portion… 🙂 but I suspect she misses it. It made our meal times far more interesting!!
Oh, yum, I’m a sucker for a savory hand pie, yours sound incredible! I love how you made them in little circles too.
Dini, these look amazing! The gooey cheese pictures look mouthwatering good!
Thank you Michelle! 🙂
Oozing with cheese look delicious!
You are my go to eggplant person Dini! These look fabulous…can’t wait to try them. I’m the only one in my family that likes eggplant but I love it so maybe these will sway my family.
Thank you Denise! 🙂 I do love Eggplant (maybe more than the average person!)
Dini, these look so amazie! I def have to make these! And i love how perfectly you cut out the dough…so smart
Thank you Mila! 🙂 I liked them better perfectly round too! Appealed to the OCD in me 😉
There’s just something magical about hand pies. Fun to eat for sure! Love the flavor combination.
Thank you Katie 🙂
Oh, yum, Dini! Another fabulous way to eat caponata! The photo of the pile of hand pies, one open and cheesy, is making me so hungry! Pinned to make this recipe for sure! (right after the brown butter noodles, which I can’t stop thinking about!)
Thank you so much Wendy! 😀 You know that I ate that melted cheese pie as soon as I finishes taking photos! 😛 I just can’t resist melted cheese 🙂 Please let me know what you think of the brown butter pasta too 🙂