One of the things I (Kate) love most about my Grandma’s pie crust is how it is both thin and flakey. You might be holding your breath now, as I would be, wondering what form of fat we use in the crust. So I’ll get right to it. We make our crust with shortening. Pie crusts made with lard taste like animal to me, and I don’t like animal flavors in my desserts. I have had good crusts made with butter, but they tend to be thicker and, no matter what butter defenders say, less flakey.
Shortening cut into flour mixture with pastry blender.
So when you want a pie crust that doesn’t vie for attention, but beautifully compliments the filling, here is your recipe. You don’t have to obtain ice water for this crust or wash the food processor after you make it, either. This is pie crust the simpler, old fashioned way.
One-third of pie dough shaped into a ball and resting on wax paper.
PIE CRUST
Makes enough dough for three thin pie crusts
2 1/3 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup shortening (we use the Crisco shortening bars to avoid messy measuring; 1 stick =1 cup)
1/2 cup boiling water
Stir together flour, baking powder, and salt with a whisk, a fork, or a pastry blender (see photo of wooden-handled instrument in bowl for image of our pastry blender). Using a pastry blender or your clean fingers, cut the shortening into the flour mixture. Whatever instrument you use, the idea is to mix the flour and shortening until the shortening is in little clumps about the size of small peas. Add the boiling water and stir with a rubber spatula until completely mixed, but no longer than you need to.
Form the dough into three equal balls. Place a ball on top of a long sheet of wax paper, smash the ball into a circle, then cover it with another long sheet of wax paper. Roll the dough into an oval roughly 13 by 11 inches tall and wide. You might want to hold it up to your pie dish to make sure you’ve rolled it out sufficiently.
To release the rolled-out dough from the wax paper, pull the wax paper off the top, then lay it back on top, flip the dough over, and pull off that sheet of wax paper. Now you can either drape it into a pie dish (it works for many different sizes), removing the wax paper, or sandwich it back between the two sheets of wax paper, fold it in quarters, and put it in a gallon-size Ziplock freezer bag for freezing (for up to a year). After pressing the crust into the pie dish, roll under the edges, tearing off a swatch from a long section and pinching it onto a short section if you need to. Most people crimp the edges, but I like to just leave them rolled under.
For unbaked pies, shape tinfoil along the dough, then fill it with pie beads or dried beans and bake the crust at 375 degrees for 30 minutes. Remove the beads or beans and tinfoil and finish baking for another 10 to 15 minutes, until golden. The beads/beans help prevent the crust from shrinking too much, but they also prevent it from browning.
To parbake a crust (which we do for pumpkin pie), bake the crust with tinfoil and beads or beans, as described above, at 375 degrees for twenty minutes, then remove the tinfoil and beads/beans, add the filling, and complete baking according to the recipe.
For baked pies, follow the recipe.
Pie crust rolled out between two sheets of wax paper.