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Baking peach pies for nutritional program

Several weeks ago, Matthew McNair secondary school launched its first week of participation in the BC School Fruit & Vegetable Nutritional program.

Several weeks ago, Matthew McNair secondary school launched its first week of participation in the BC

School Fruit & Vegetable Nutritional program.

It's is a collaboration between Healthy Families BC and the BC Ministry of Health, and is administered through the BC Agriculture in the Classroom

Foundation, a nonprofit organization devoted to "working to bring BC's agriculture to our students."

My students and I distributed prune plums to every student and staff member in our school, and the following week, my Culinary Arts students and I made three different plum desserts to allow interested students to sample plums in baked goods. The desserts were wellreceived, and in the coming weeks and months, it will be interesting to let students try the various

fruits and vegetables, not only raw, but also cooked or prepared in a different way to show the students how versatile and tasty fruits and vegetables can be.

Last week was our second delivery of local B.C. produce and we were fortunate enough to receive a shipment of organic peaches from Harker's Organics, a five-generation family business located in Cawston, B.C. The variety of peaches they supplied was O'Henry, a bright redskinned, medium-large freestone peach with very little fuzz and yellow flesh that is sweet and juicy.

This week, I will be featuring the leftover peaches in peach hand pies.

Actually, the ones that my students and I will be making for the student population to sample are more like "finger pies" because they are tiny.

Since we're into October now, peaches are scarce, but you can make hand pies with peaches, nectarines, plums, or almost any other fruit that you like.

Just be sure to dice the fruit finely and depending on how sweet and juicy the fruit is, adjust the amount of sugar and cornstarch accordingly.

The recipes are adapted from Smitten Kitchen (Deb Perelman's popular food blog and website).

Peach Hand Pies

(Yield: 24 or more, depending on the size of the cookie cutters)

Ingredients for Crust: 3 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 tbsp sugar

1 1/2 tsp salt

1 1/2 cups unsalted butter, very cold & cut into 1/2" cubes

3/4 to 1 cup buttermilk coarse sanding sugar for decoration

Directions for Crust:

1. In large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar and salt. Add butter, working it in with a pastry blender to make a coarse/crumbly mixture, leaving most of the butter in large, peasized pieces.

2. Stir in the 3/4 cup buttermilk; the dough won't be cohesive.

Using your hands, bring it together into a ball by kneading gently.

If it is still too dry, add more buttermilk, about one tablespoon at a time and knead briefly until it comes together.

Divide dough in half, wrap each half in plastic wrap, flatten into a disc and chill in fridge for at least one hour or overnight.

Ingredients for Filling:

2 1/2 lbs peaches

2 tsp fresh lemon juice

3 tbsp sugar (1/4 cup for a sweeter filling)

3 tbsp light brown sugar (1/4 cup for a sweeter filling)

pinch ground cinnamon pinch salt

2 tbsp + 1 tsp corn starch

Directions for Filling:

1. Chop peaches into small pieces (approx. 1/4-inch dice).

2. In large bowl, mix together fruit and remaining ingredients; mix until well combined.

Set fruit mixture aside.

Assembling the Pies:

1. Remove dough from fridge, unwrap and roll dough on a floured work surface until 1/8 inch thick.

Using a 3" cookie cutter, cut out pie shapes (round or square) from dough and remove scraps.

Place on a parchmentlined baking sheet and fill the centre of each pie with a small amount of fruit filling.

Do not be tempted to overfill the pies. Dough scraps can be re-rolled but handle the dough as little as possible and work quickly to prevent making the dough tough.

2. Quickly brush a little cold water around the circumference of the dough, and fold it in half so the other side comes down over the filling, creating either a semicircle or triangle.

Seal the hand pie, and make a decorative edge by pressing the edges of the dough together with the back of a fork.

Repeat process with remaining dough.

Place the hand pies back on the parchmentlined baking sheet, and return to the refrigerator to chill for another 30 minutes.

3. Heat oven to 375°F. Remove the chilled hand pies from the refrigerator, cut a small slit in each, and lightly brush with the egg yolk wash.

Sprinkle sanding sugar generously over the pies and place pies in the oven to bake.

Bake until the hand pies are golden brown and just slightly cracked, about 20-25 minutes.

Remove the pies from the oven and let stand to cool slightly before serving.

4. Leftover fruit filling can be placed in a saucepan, cooked and stirred gently over medium heat until cornstarch and juices thicken. Remove from heat, cool and serve with ice cream.