Ted’s Trusty Pie Crust

A simple yet elegant way to make a great pie crust.

OK, this is basic stuff here… one of the first recipes anyone familiar with baking learns. Yea, sure… there are dozens of variations on making crusts and treating or even mis-treating your dough but.. the following is pretty simple, straight forward and easy enough for even the littlest muppet to master so go ahead and give it a try… Hope you like it as much as we do.

INGREDIENTS:
225g unsalted butter, chilled
375g all-purpose flour
40g white sugar (or 50g raw cane sugar)
80ml ice water

The big dilemma for those of us who like to cook but don’t always have the time to do everything perfectly is whether to attempt to make our own pie crust or to buy a frozen store bought version. Most store bought pie crusts available in supermarkets bake up into something that can taste pretty industrial. So should you choose to make your own pie crust, there are a dozen methods out there for doing so. Every cook and every cookbook seems to have their own favorite. All butter, all shortening, vegetable oil, part butter/part shortening, lard; the list goes on. The issue with shortening is that most shortening contains tons of trans fats. We don’t want any trans fats so wour recipes do not use shortening of any sort – let us know how the following performs for you.

DIRECTIONS
1. Combine flour and sugar into the bowl of a kitchen mixer (we use a kitchen aid). Cut the butter or margarine or butter and shortening into tablespoon sized pieces; add it to the flour and sugar. Use the paddle beater to cut the butter and flour together.

2. With the mixer on low speed , or while stirring the mixture with a fork, pour in the cold water. When the dough starts to clump, and before it turns into a ball, stop stirring.

3. Remove the bowl from the mixer and lightly knead the dough in the bowl until it forms a ball. Divide dough into two parts. Knead the dough just enough to form hockey puck shaped discs, do not over-knead. You should be able to see little bits of butter and sugar crystals in the dough. Sprinkle a little flour around the discs. Wrap each disc in plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 1 hour, and up to 2 days.

4. Remove one pie crust disk from the refrigerator. Let sit at room temperature for 5-10 minutes in order to soften just enough to make rolling out a bit easier. Roll out with a rolling pin on a lightly floured surface to a 12-inch (30cm)circle; about 1/8 of an inch thick (30mm). As you roll out the dough, check if the dough is sticking to the surface below. If necessary, add a few sprinkles of flour under the dough to keep the dough from sticking. Carefully place onto a 9-inch (22cm) pie plate. Gently press the pie dough down so that it lines the bottom and sides of the pie plate. Use a pair of kitchen scissors to trim the dough to within 1/2 inch of the edge of the pie dish or roll the over-lapping dough back over itself and press together to make a thicker outer crust.