I've always been a huge fan of portable food. Personal sized treats are always a crowd pleaser, and when I decided to sell a baked-good for a fundraiser for Caravan, I was set on making hand pies. A good friend of mine is a bit of a pie aficionado and when we teamed up for this fundraiser, I knew I had to have her help me develop a sinfully delicious hand pie recipes. Well two days of prep, countless test recipes, three different fillings, and hours of baking later, we came up with this wonderful sour cream based crust. We filled them with her signature jersey blueberry filling and sold over 80 of these bad boys at The Barbary. This recipe is great for summer fruits (peach, apricot, nectarine) but is also great for savory fillings too- We tried vegan chorizo and turkey with summer squash and they were all a hit, you could even go ahead an call them empanadas if you're feeling festive.

Blueberry Hand Pie

Makes roughly 18 Hand Pies

Sour Cream Crust

2 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon granulated sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 pound (2 sticks) butter, cut into 1/2" cubes

1 8-ounce container sour cream

1 to 2 tablespoons cold milk, optional

In a medium mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar and salt. Add the butter and mix together. Put the bowl in the freezer for 10 minutes. On a clean dry counter roll out the dough, flattening butter into flour. Knead the dough until butter is throughly mixed into the crust and return to the freezer for an additional 5 minutes. Repeat once more and freeze for 10 minutes. If mixture becomes dry add milk. Fold in sour cream and combine. Cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes or overnight.

Blueberry Filling

2 cups sugar

3 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 cup water

6 cups fresh blueberries

2 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

In a saucepan, combine all ingredients and simmer for 10 minutes or until mixture reduces and thickens.

On a floured surface, roll out dough until about 1/8 inch thick, an empanada press makes this easier. Cut dough into a 6 inch circle with a cutter or round bowl. Add 2 tablespoons mixture to center and fold dough over mixture, and sealing edges with a few drops of cool water. Cut a 'V' shaped vents in top and bake at 350 for 25 minutes or until golden brown.

The pick-your-own farms that litter the Delaware river bed are in full season.The fertile land holds many of my earliest childhood memories that is the joy of gorging yourself in a field of fresh ripe berries that are just waiting to be eaten.

This weekend my sister and I picked our hearts out at Phillips Farm in Milford, New Jersey. This sprawling and vast 200 acre farm sits above the mighty Delaware River and offers an amazing selection of pick-your-own strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, raspberries & peaches

After picking our black raspberries and blueberries, we headed home to help prepare for a feast that night, a celebration of my sisters return to the States. Her father, a veteran pastry chef turned IT professional, had been preparing food for the occasion and smoking a brisket all day. I decided to make a dessert from the fresh berries we had picked that day for the occasion and came up with this recipe.

The tart was a lovely, indulgent and refreshing finale to the mass feast dubbed 'Lynchfeast' and was shared in the wee hours of the night over candle light on the patio overlooking Lynch creek where the feast was held. The tart was devoured that night and no evidence remained except the berry blood stained grins that were on the faces of the satisfied friends and family.