Buffalo Chicken Blue Cheese Hand Pies

These Buffalo Chicken Blue Cheese Hand Pies have all the flavor of buffalo chicken wings and blue cheese stuffed inside a buttery pastry baked to flakey perfection.

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I wrapped up all that buffalo chicken flavor in a beautifully flaky, all-butter pâte brisée, which is fancy French for “pie crust”. The buffalo sauce permeates the pastry making the whole pie one cohesive flavor. Dipped in some cooling blue cheese dressing it is divine!

These little pies are crowd pleasers. Their charm should not be limited to just football parties, tailgates and manly baby showers — These are take-anywhere-and-collect-the-accolades pies. You should bring my saucy baked chicken wings, baba ganoush and easy garlic knots just to seal the deal! Why not lean into the vibe and bring Buffalo chicken dip as well!

Or should I say boy? Because that’s what we are celebrating here! David from Spiced is having a little baby boy, and these hand pies are my contribution to his MANLY baby shower.

David and I go way back. I love me some Spiced Blog.

He is my go-to resource for “man-food”. He tosses around buffalo sauce, bacon and all things grilled like it ain’t no thang.

But it also always has a refined twist. It’s not just grilled meat on a plate caveman style. No, no. Everything he makes is beautiful and, yet, appeals to the tastebuds of those with a y-chromosome.  {If it’s been awhile since High School biology, that is nerd speak for “men” 😉 }

All I can say is that this baby is one lucky taste-tester!

Tasked with creating man-food that was David-worthy, I had a momentary freakout and then remembered buffalo wings. Is there anything more manly than buffalo chicken wings? Psh. No.

Fine motorcycles, but those aren’t edible.

They are also incredibly easy to pull together. {Shhhh}

I used a store-bought rotisserie chicken (I know shame on me…but I’m busy, okay?), so the filling was ready in under 3 minutes. The most “time consuming” part is waiting for your pastry to chill, which just means more time to curl up with your favorite book…or binge watch Orange is the New Black. Your call. #nojudgement

I cut the circles using a 4 inch ring cutter but you could use a 2.5 – 3 inch one to make cute, little, one-bite hand pies. How adorable would that be?!

Serve with blue cheese or ranch dressing and celery slices for the full chicken wing experience!

Now for a quick little pastry lesson – because I just cannot resist a teachable moment at my expense.
Observe:

This is the same pastry dough. I made both hand pies with the same technique and love. Yet, the one on the right is so flakey and puffy it almost looks like puff pastry. The difference is refrigeration. The pies on the right chilled overnight and the ones on the left only 1 hour. You want that butter to completely re-solidify, so that when it is popped in the screaming hot oven, the water in the butter evaporates to create steam that expands and puffs your pastry. There is other stuff going on here but suffice it to say “Chill that pastry!”

Be sure to check out all the other phenomenal bloggers who are contributing to David’s baby shower! You won’t want to miss a single recipe! Huge props to Chris from Shared Appetite for putting this fabulous shower together!

I used this all-butter pie crust to make these fabulous (manly) hand pies!

5 from 1 ratings

Buffalo Chicken Blue Cheese Hand Pies

by Chef Lindsey

These Buffalo Chicken Blue Cheese Hand Pies have all the flavor of buffalo chicken wings and blue cheese stuffed inside a buttery pastry and baked to flakey perfection.

Prep: 30 minutes mins

Cook: 15 minutes mins

Chill Time: 20 minutes mins

Total: 1 hour hr 5 minutes mins

Servings: 8 people

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Ingredients 

US CustomaryMetric

 

1x2x3x

For the Filling:

• ▢ ½ cup Frank’s Red Hot sauce
• ▢ ¼ cup butter melted
• ▢ ¼ teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
• ▢ Freshly ground black pepper to taste
• ▢ 2 chicken breasts cooked, shredded (or roast chicken)
• ▢ ¼ cup blue cheese crumbles

Egg Wash:

• ▢ 2 eggs
• ▢ 1 tablespoon heavy cream
• ▢ ½ teaspoon kosher salt

1 double crust recipe for pâte brisée

• ▢ Blue Cheese or Ranch Salad Dressing
• ▢ Celery sliced thinly

Instructions 

To Make Egg Wash:

• Place all ingredients in a small bowl. You can whisk with a whisk or a fork until homogenous, but I like to use an immersion hand blender because it is faster and produces a smooth mixture that you just can’t get by hand.

To Make Hand Pies:

• Roll out pastry to 1/8 inch thick. Cut rounds with a 4-inch round cutter (Photo 1) and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment. Refrigerate for 20 minutes.
• While your pastry chills, whisk together hot sauce, butter, Worcestershire sauce and black pepper in a large bowl. Add chicken to bowl and toss to coat.
• Remove your rounds from the refrigerator and place about a heaping tablespoon of chicken filling in the center of each round; sprinkle with blue cheese crumbles (Photo 2). Brush a little egg wash onto the outer edge of half of the pastry circle. Add just enough to dampen; you don’t want it dripping down the sides or pooling on the pastry (Photo 3).
• Gently fold the pastry circle in half. I like to corral the filling with my thumbs while lifting the pastry over the chicken. This ensures that the filling stays inside where it belongs. Press down the edges to seal. You can also crimp the edges or press with the tines of a fork. Brush a light coating of egg wash over the top of the hand pie. Refrigerate at least 1 hour or overnight.
• Pre-heat oven to 425°
• Cut several vents on the top of the cold pastry with a pairing knife. Bake in pre-heated oven for 20-25 minutes. If you chilled your pastry overnight, it might need an additional 5 minutes. The crust should be golden brown and the edges should be puffed with no visible unbaked dough.
• Serve warm.

Notes

Notes:
You can re-roll your pastry scraps once and still achieve a flakey crust. Gather all your scraps into a ball and press them together – they don’t need to be one cohesive mass – when you roll them out, the layers of scraps will come together into one piece. This also helps keep it flakey. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill 2 hours or overnight. Proceed with the recipe above.

Blue Cheese Salad Dressing – Store bought makes me sad, but in a pinch you can doctor it to make it better. In a bowl mix 8oz of dressing with 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce, 2 teaspoons red or white wine vinegar, several dashes of hot sauce, ¼ cup blue cheese and black pepper to taste. Mix it up with an immersion hand blender, blender or Nutribullet. See, life is better already.

Store in the refrigerator in an airtight container and re-heat in the oven.

Nutrition

Calories: 159kcal | Carbohydrates: 1g | Protein: 16g | Fat: 10g | Saturated Fat: 6g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 1g | Monounsaturated Fat: 3g | Trans Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 98mg | Sodium: 750mg | Potassium: 141mg | Sugar: 1g | Vitamin A: 306IU | Vitamin C: 1mg | Calcium: 38mg | Iron: 1mg

Course: Appetizer

Cuisine: American

Calories: 159

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