Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (176 C)
Open up refrigerated pie crusts. These come in a box in the refrigerator section of your grocery store. Generally speaking, there will be 2individually wrapped pie crust in each box. You will be using both of them. Flour your work surface and rolling pin. Gently roll pie dough crust a little thinner.
Find a round bowl or large cup as your stencil and cut into circles. The size bowl we used was 5.5 inches (14 cm). You want your round stencil it to be big enough for your pie to fit in one hand but not so small that it is difficult to stuff and seal.
Use your bowl or cup as a stencil and cut around the edges with a butter knife. Remove excess dough. Roll all excess dough into a ball. Use a rolling pin to roll out the dough until all of the pie crust dough is used. Make as many round circles as you can with the pie dough. We made 10 circles.
Brush beaten egg around the edge of the round pie crust dough circles. The egg will help seal the Easy Pumpkin Empanadas.
Place about 1-2 tablespoons of date sweetened pumpkin pie filling over ½ of the pie crust. Keep at least 1 inch away from the sides. Do not overfill as it will be VERY difficult to close and seal the hand pie. The amount of pie filling needed for each depends on how big of a bowl stencil you used.
Fold the empanada in half and press down with your fingers to seal around the edges.
Next, either use your fork to crimp the edges and seal or use a fold over technique as shown in the video below.
Use a fork to place a couple of holes in the top of the crust so the steam has some place to escape during the baking process.
Brush the tops with a little egg wash and bake for 15-18 minutes or until golden brown.
OPTIONAL: Mix date sugar (or alternative sweetener and cinnamon in a little bowl) Sprinkle pumpkin empanadas with a little date sugar and cinnamon, if desired.
Enjoy! Can be served hot out of the oven or room temperature