American Pie Crust - A quirky, but succesful, method from King Arthur Flour

American Pie.  The pie crust is the key, isn't it?  It is to pie lovers, like my husband.  My son, too.  A pie crust has to be tender and flaky.  Am I right?  The debate goes on as to which is better-- an all butter crust vs. using shortening.  In my beginning baking years, I used to buy Mrs. Smith's frozen pies.  I was too intimidated to try making pie crust, from scratch.  Then, I transitioned to buying ready made pie crusts.  Eventually, I started to make pie crusts with my food processor.  I'd whir the dough around for an eternity, not realizing that I was doing a fabulous job of building up the gluten.  My pie crusts were tough, but at that time I didn't really notice. That's because  I don't eat the crust.  I'm one of those pie eaters, who scoops out the contents of the pie and tosses away the rest.

I married a man who loves pie. He loves pie crust. A lot. Seriously. He could eat pie for breakfast, and be totally content.  His favorite summer pie is "Olallieberry Pie".  I shared this all butter pie crust (from Ina Garten) as a tutorial (and it's gotten a lot of views).

In the Fall, I believe that Pumpkin Pie is one of the most traditional desserts that graces a Thanksgiving table.  Pecan comes in as a close second. Some years, I like to try new pumpkin desserts-- like Pumpkin Ice Cream, or Pumpkin Pana Cota.  This year, I wanted to make traditional pumpkin pie.  I wanted to try the shortening and butter approach of making a pie crust.  One of my most trusted internet  recipes sources, King Arthur Flour, had several pie crust recipes.  I watched their video, and I was totally sold on making a pie crust without a food processor!     There are four kitchen tools/supplies that you need, for this technique--  a rolling pin, parchment paper, a pastry cutter (you could use two forks)  and and a spray bottle. For those of you who say you hate to bake-- and worse, that believe you can't make pie crusts...  watch and see.

I've own a pie crust shield for years, to prevent my pie crusts from turning too dark.  The problem is, it ruins my pie crusts because I tend to use a deep-dish pie plate.  I now prefer to roll foil to fit my pie plate.  Spray the pie plate, so that the pie slices are easier to remove. You're welcome.

Measure your 3 cups of unbleached flour (of course, I only use King Arthur Flour), salt  and 1/2 cup shortening (a printable recipe card is at the end of this post).  Cut the shortening in until it's the size of small peas.   I have to admit, it wasn't hard work at all.

I usually grate my cold cheese. But, like the recipe instructed me to, I cut the butter into thin slices and added it to the coarse flour and shortening.  Very gently, with my hands, I mixed the butter with the flour. Then broke the butter to about the size of my thumbnail.

 Ice water is important-- not cold tap water.  The recipe said between 6-9 Tablespoons of water.  I quit at 9 Tablespoons, while stirring it with a fork.  I wasn't quite sure when to quit-- as the recipe said to quite when the dough is "shaggy" and "almost moist".  So, remember that parchment paper and spray bottle I mentioned?  Here's the quirky part:

Spread the shaggy dough on top of parchment paper.  Take one side of the parchment paper and fold it over the dough and press down. 

See? The dough is a bit dry, still (I should have added one or two more Tablespoons of water.)

Now spray with water, until the dough is moistened.  The theory-- which makes complete sense to me, now-- is that we are not going to overwork the dough.  We also want to allow those pieces of butter to stay whole.  I press the dough, almost like a letter, to build layers.   Finally, it all came together.

 I cut the dough into unequal halves. Why? Because one pie plate is deeper and larger than the other!

I'm holding a cross section.  Those will become tender layers of flavor. I totally have faith in that.

Gently pat the dough into a circle, wrap in plastic, refrigerate,  and allow to rest for at least 30 minutes.  You can certainly make the pie crust dough several days in advance.

 Rolling pins... I have finally fallen in-love with my tapered rolling pin.  As long as I run a little flour over the rolling pin, I don't have a problem with the pie dough sticking.

I finally mastered the simple art of rolling pie dough.  Start from the center and roll out.  I no longer roll back and forth, and now my pie crusts don't stick and they aren't tough, from being overworked. One last tip-- turn the dough a quarter turn.  If the dough sticks, then add a little flour underneath.  All my broken pie crust problems have been solved!

Can you see that nice chunk of butter in the right corner?  It's simple science-- the butter causes the crust to steam = tender and delicious crust.   I find that wrapping my pin around the dough, and then unwrapping it onto my pie plate works perfectly-- every time.

My crust was a little unevenly shaped. I simply took some excess trimmings, and added it underneath the area that needed more.  Crimping will hide that patch job.

It's fun to play with my food.

Here's a more traditional crimp.

Here's how I did it, from an earlier post for a two-crust pie.

For my second pie, I snipped the dough with kitchen shears...

That's kind of fun-- a checkerboard crust.

FINAL NOTES: The prepared pie crusts should be chilled for at least 30 minutes before using. Yes, you can freeze these as well, and use them another time-- like the day after. 

I simply don't see a need to buy pre-made pie crusts.  Have you read the ingredients lately?  I actually find pie crusts on the therapeutic side to make.  There's something really satisfying when I roll out a pie crust and crimp it.  It feels like a true accomplishment.  Of course, the question is-- is this a good recipe?

VERDICT:  This dough is very easy to work with, and rolls out beautifully.  I found the pie crust to be truly tender.  My husband really liked the pie crust a lot.  He says it's just like his mom's old-fashioned pie crust. I still am a big fan of all-butter crusts, and I'm a tart kinda gal.  I gave my husband the crust, and gutted the pumpkin pie.  Considering I had some rather generous helpings of my revised sweet potato casserole (coming up soon), that was probably a better idea.

Here's a sneak preview to the pumpkin pie recipe, that was new to me.  It was excellent.  Yes, I will be sharing that one, too.

I was hoping to embed the King Arthur Video on this post, but I'm a little leery about playing around with HTML codes within my template.  So, instead, here's the link to see this really cool pie crust technique.

A printable recipe card is at the end of this post, and at the end of the video.

I keep saying-- King Arthur Flour doesn't pay me to promote their products, website or recipes.  I do it, because I'm a very happy customer, and I have great results with their recipes.  Plus, they're nice people to deal with on the phone.