Lara Jean’s Cherry Turnovers from PS I Still Love You

Name: Lara Jean's Cherry Turnovers
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 25 min
Total time: 1 h 40 min
Ingredients: ½ Cup (115g) Unsalted Butter; 1 Cup (150g) All Purpose Flour; 1/4 Cup (30g) Powdered Sugar; 1/4 Tsp Kosher Salt; 1 Tsp Vanilla Extract; 1 Tsp Apple Cider Vinegar; 3-4 Tbsp Cold Water; 540 mL Can Cherry Pie Filling*; 1/8 Cup Packed Brown Sugar *; Zest from 1/2 an Orange (or sub Lemon); 1 Tbsp Fresh Orange Juice (or sub Lemon); Pinch of Salt; Egg Wash: 1 Egg, 1 Tbsp Water; Optional: Raw Sugar

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Inspired by Jenny Han’s To All the Boy’s: PS I Still Love You, I’ve created Lara Jean’s Cherry Turnovers. These are adorable, but most importantly, they are flaky, sweet yet tart, and delicious!

PS I Still Love You

Last night, after binge watching PS I Still Love You again for the 10th time, I came across the scene where Lara Jean makes Cherry Turnovers for Peter on Valentine’s Day. I was so inspired by this that I had to make them. Also in celebration of the today’s release of the third and final film of the trilogy To All the Boy’s I’ve Loved Before, Always and Forever, I thought it would be very fitting. It’s also perfect timing, as Valentine’s Day is only two days away!

As a baker, this scene in the film is so nostalgic, comforting and aesthetically pleasing. They basically show you step by step how to recreate these cherry turnovers. Just from this scene I could tell that the dough was an all butter pie crust, and the filling was made from reducing cherries.

Lara Jean making Cherry Turnovers – from the film PS I Still Love You. Photo Credit City Nomads

How To Make Cherry Turnovers

Turnovers are essentially a mini pie, but way cuter. It takes a lot less time for these to bake versus a traditional pie and they’re perfect to give as gifts as they are already individual sized. Who wants to receive a slice of cherry pie, when you can get these adorable cherry turnovers instead?

All Butter Pie Crust

This is an all butter pie crust that comes together in minutes. I stick to all butter because it tastes good and I always have butter at home. You can do this by hand, or in a food processor and both turn out perfect. I decide what to use depending on how many dishes I want to do haha.

There are a few tips in making a good pie crust. The most important tip is that you keep the butter cold and with lumps in the dough. Little pieces of butter throughout the dough is what gives you that classic flaky pie crust. You can achieve this by not overworking the dough and placing it in the freezer when it starts to melt.

Another tip, but more like secret ingredient is the addition of Apple Cider Vinegar. I learned this from Food Wishes who says the addition of apple cider vinegar prevents the formation of gluten, creating a flaky crust. Though I don’t really know the science behind this, it has worked well for me and I always use this trick.

Cherry Pie Filling

I have a confession to make here – I cheated and used store bought cherry pie filling. I can already imagine you behind the screen judging me. “Why would you make your own pie crust but then buy store bought filling?”. The answer is because of where I live!! I live in Alberta, Canada, and in February it is COLD. I am telling you it is -30 Degrees Celsius (-22 Fahrenheit for you American folks). Which means there is NO FRESH CHERRIES HERE. I found a bag of cherries at the grocery store, imported from the US, at a steal of $9 per pound. I’m not joking, it would have costed me around $15CAD for a bag of bland cherries.

A can of cherry pie filling roughly comes to $4 CAD, which really felt like the most reasonable option. I bought a no name brand but really regretted and wish I had splurged the extra $1 for E.D. Smith’s Cherry Pie Filling. Regardless, these cherry turnovers still turned out delicious, but I know when cherries are in season I will be rushing to the grocery store. In the meanwhile if you have access to fresh cherries please use those instead and try this recipe by Sally’s Baking Addiction for her homemade Cherry Pie Filling.

The benefit of store bought cherry filling is that it comes together in no time. Technically you could use the stuff right out of the can, but I recommend you add some extra ingredients to add more flavour. Lara Jean uses lemon juice but I decided to try orange zest and juice instead and it turned out great. You can always use lemon though.

Assembling Cherry Turnovers

This is my favourite part in making these cherry turnovers. I don’t know why but assembling these cherry turnovers made me so happy and it made me feel like I was a part of the film (cheesy I know).

Roll out the chilled pie dough to 1/8 inch thickness and cut into little rectangles. I cut mine quite small – 2 inches by 6 inches. The cherry turnovers in PS I Still Love you look bigger, around 3-4 inches by 8 inches so adjust as you like. If you want to make them bigger, then I highly recommend you double the pie crust so you will get more turnovers.

Use a small cookie scoop to help you portion out even amounts of filling. Before placing the top piece of the dough, make sure you cut out 3 horizontal slits on on the top. It is so much harder to do after you’ve put them on top. Use egg wash to help stick the top and bottom together.

Lastly, this isn’t in the movie but I always love adding this to my pies. I sprinkled on some raw sugar on the tops of the turnovers, after brushing them with egg wash. It looks so pretty and adds extra texture and sweetness. Of course this is optional and you can skip this if you like.

I hope you give this a recipe a try. One because it’s super cute to recreate things out of your favourite movie. And more importantly because these are delicious and are a perfect snack or gift!