Yes You Can!
There is one simple instruction behind making a light and flaky pie crust:
Handle the dough as little as possible.
Pie crust is the opposite of bread. With bread, you want to knead for a long time. The kneading allows gluten to form (individual molecules of glutenin become linked together into long strands), which makes the dough elastic, so that it will retain the CO2 exhaled by the growing yeast. [Memories from Home Ec: walking down the hall in junior high with my friend Candy, reciting, in time to our steps, “GLU-ten IS e-LAS-TIC e-NOUGH TO re-TAIN THE GAS BUB-bles FORMED BY the YEAST!”] Now, elasticity is exactly what you don’t want in a pie crust, so anything that helps gluten to form is a no-no. Really, that’s the entire secret. Well, ok, coolth also helps.
I use my Mom’s pie crust recipe, but actually was taught The Secret by my late Mother-in-Law, Carol, whose pie crust was (also) legendary. Mom was the oldest girl of 9 children in a Yugoslavian immigrant family, and didn’t really have the idea of teaching her kids to do stuff like make a flaky pie crust. Nobody taught her anything, they just left her to watch and figure it out, and I think she assumed we would figure it out, too. It wasn't until I was married, and requested a lesson from my most excellent mother-in-law, that I learned how to make pie crust properly. I now manage to make good, flaky crust pretty reliably, but I'm no super-expert, so I look forward to hearing your own hints and recipes!
Back in the early 20th Century, women just knew how to make pie crust, apparently. My father’s mother’s church published a cookbook once, and the pie crust recipe listed the flour, salt, and fat, and the instructions were simply, “Make into a pastry.” Not everyone knows what that means nowadays (I sure didn't), for example, that the "make" step includes adding cold water. I’ll start with the best general instructions I know for mixing a crust, then give two different, well-tested sets of ingredients for pie crust, and a link to a rather unorthodox one. I’ll follow with the two pie fillings – just plain ol’ apple pie and pumpkin pie – that are the ones I actually make - and end with some videos that tell parts of this story better than words do.
Mixing pie crust (see ingredients lists below):
Mix the flour and salt in a medium mixing bowl. Add the refrigerated Crisco or lard in moderate-sized dollops or dice, ideally keeping them separate by coating them with the flour. Using whatever method you like (two knives, a pastry cutter), cut the fat with the flour and salt until the fat bits are about pea-sized. [Large peas are acceptable. Don’t overdo it.] Add a Tbsp of the cold water, sprinkling it around a bit, and stir lightly with a fork to incorporate the water into the flour mixture. Slowly add the other Tbsp(s) of water called for in the recipe, favoring any flour bits that are still dry, and mixing lightly as you do so. If absolutely necessary, you can add a bit more water than the recipe calls for to wet any dry bits, but you probably can (and should) go on to the final step without doing that. It's important to realize that you don't need anything like homogeneity at this point. (The picture shows pie dough right before water was added.)
Gather the dough into a ball. I touch the ball against any lagging bits of flour in the bowl to incorporate them. Form a nice ball (or two, if you have made a top and bottom crust), but don’t knead at all. You’re done.
Many recipes suggest you refrigerate the dough for a bit at this point so it is cold when you roll it out, or so any gluten formed will relax. I typically don’t do that, but if you want to wait to roll out the dough, definitely let it wait in the fridge, wrapped in waxed paper (which is compostable, so preferred over plastic wrap).
Rolling out the dough:
Flour a clean board well (or use a cold tile if you have one - but if you have a pastry tile, you undoubtedly don't need to learn any of this from me!). Roll the ball just a bit, turn 90 degrees, roll a bit more. Don’t try to get it crust-thin all at once. Turn the crust over onto the (well-floured) surface before it gets mashed enough to stick to the board, and continue rolling. Flour the rolling pin so that it doesn’t pick up the dough. When the dough is a large enough circle to fit the pie pan and hang over a bit, you’re done. A bit of gluten will form in this rolling process, which allows the dough to cohere somewhat but not to get gummy (this and other gluten information from Harold McGee’s amazing On Food and Cooking).
Assembling the pie:
I did learn from watching Mom that the way to get the crust into the pie pan is to fold it gently in half and lift it carefully into the pan, then unfold carefully (the videos show this). The crust might fracture a bit; you can stick it back together, rubbing a bit of water on the split edges if that helps. No biggie. (If you have a repair in the top crust, people will be very sure you have made the pie for them by yourself, and will be especially appreciative and grateful!)
If you should have to gather up the crust and re-roll it, it will not be as good as if you didn’t re-work it, but it will be better than not having pie, and likely still a lot better than any store-bought pie crust you’ve ever had.
I also learned to make the edges of the crust pretty by watching Mom. If the crust at the edge is a bit thin in spots, I add some of the extra dough that is hanging over the edge. Then I crimp the edges using the thumb and forefinger of my right hand, and pressing the crust into a series of “Vs” between them with the finger of my left hand (beautifully shown in the videos). This is more conveniently done before adding filling to a one-crust pie. If you will have a top crust, add the filling, then roll out the top crust, lay it carefully over the top of the filling, also hanging off the edge a bit, and pierce a few times to let air escape, then use the crimping step to join the top and bottom crusts together.
Cut off the extra dough around the edges, and put this in pieces on a small cookie tray so you can bake it, too (but only 10 minutes or fewer – watch!) You can add jelly before or after baking (I prefer after) to make tasty little pie crust treats.
My pie recipes generally call for the pie to be placed into a preheated 450 degree oven, which is turned down after about 10 minutes to 350 degrees and cooked till done (usually 45-60 minutes total).
Two excellent pie crust recipes (plus a link):
Mom's pie crust is very rich, as measured by the high ratio of fat to flour. The Crisco crust I think is more flavorful, while the lard crust is flakier.
Mom’s pie crust (my additions in [ ]s):
Makes enough for a single-crust pie in a 10” pie dish. Double this recipe for a two-crust pie.
1 cup all-purpose flour
½ cup Crisco [refrigerated]
½ tsp salt
2 Tbsp water [Cold water is optimal – put an ice cube in it while you gather the other ingredients.]
Carol’s pie crust:
Makes enough for a two-crust pie. For an open-topped pie, make a half-recipe.
2 ½ cups flour
1 cup lard [refrigerated]
¼ cup water [ice water]
1 tsp salt
Pie crust with Vodka from Cook’s Illustrated:
I’ve never made this, but a friend recommended it when she heard about this diary. Seems like a lot of liquid - the water should be sufficient without even adding the vodka - so I’m skeptical, but linking it b/c it seems to have a good reputation.
http://www.cooksillustrated.com/...
Two things to put into your pie crust:
Pumpkin Pie – My variant of Mom’s recipe, with her original amounts in brackets
Mix thoroughly:
1 cup brown sugar [1 ¼ cups]
¾ tsp salt
1 ½ Tbsp flour
¾ tsp cinnamon
¼ tsp ginger
¼ tsp cloves
½ tsp nutmeg
Blend in well:
3 eggs, slightly beaten
1 large can pumpkin [2 2/3 cups]
Stir in (this is a pretty step!):
1 can evaporated milk [3/4 cup evap + 1 ½ cup milk]
Bake in a preheated oven at 450 degrees for 20 minutes, then 25 minutes at 350, or until done.
My variant is more pumpkin and less sweet, and does not leave you with partial cans of pumpkin and evaporated milk. It just barely fits into the crust in a deep, 10” pie pan – the pyrex one with little fluting around the edge - and you have to be very careful carrying it to the oven so as not to spill it! If you don’t have room for all the filling, you might as well pour the rest into a little pyrex dish and see if it will bake up nicely alongside the pie. If you have smaller pie pans, this will make two thinnish pies.
Apple pie, courtesy of the Joy of Cooking [my comments]:
Peel, seed, and slice apples to make 5-6 cups. Tart apples like Granny Smith are great, but others work just fine.
Mix the apples with:
½ to 2/3 cup white or brown sugar [Use brown! We use ½ cup.]
1/8 tsp salt
1 to 1 ½ Tbsp cornstarch [we use up to 2 Tbsp for very moist apples.]
¼ tsp cinnamon [but who measures cinnamon?]
1/8 tsp nutmeg
The recipe says to dot the filling (once in the pie crust) with butter, which we never do.
You can add water if the apples are too dry, or lemon juice and lemon zest if the apples “lack flavor.” If you want to serve with cheese, add fennel or anise instead of the sweet spices above.
Bake in a preheated 450 degree oven for 10 minutes, turn the heat to 350 and cook till the crust is golden, from 45 minutes to an hour in all.
Videos worth a thousand words:
All of these videos use a fairly shallow style of pie plate, which is not big enough for the entire pumpkin pie mix above.
1. This video (5:06) shows the mixing step well - including adding the fat in dollops – and also the rolling and transfer. She does not make the pie look very pretty, so see the other videos for crimping. Also, the cooked crusts shown at the start and finish look way overworked. Silly bit: putting dough balls into gallon plastic bags, and then flattening them a bit. Instead, flatten in your hands and wrap in waxed paper if you want to refrigerate the dough. https://www.youtube.com/...
2. This video (5:46) shows the crimping really well, and has a nifty way of getting the crust from the rolling board into the pie plate. The dough looks awfully wet to me, but the finished crust looks pretty good. https://www.youtube.com/...
3. This video (2:32) shows crimping the edges of the dough beautifully (start at 1:50)! https://www.youtube.com/...
However, to me the dough looks much too wet, so don’t necessarily try putting in all that water. Also, the first video is much better in showing how to add the fat in small pieces, which allows you to work the dough much less when cutting in the fat.
4. I’ve never tried using a food processor to make a pie crust, and I think you run the risk of overworking the dough, but this video (4:26) seemed interesting to me. I think mixing flour, salt, and fat by pulsing in the food processor makes sense, but judging when to stop adding water takes some experience, so I would suggest doing the water addition and mixing with a fork until you are used to making pie crust.
https://www.youtube.com/...
Do you have a magic pie crust recipe or hint to share, or a great filling to put into the crust?
What's for dinner at your house?