The most delicious, flakiest, all butter pie crust! Recipe doubles well for two pie crusts (double all ingredients, in step 5 pour mixture out from mixing bowl and divide into two portions and proceed with each step for each portion separately.
Servings: 8(1 single layer crust)
Prep30 minutesminutes
Cook40 minutesminutes
Chill2 hourshours
Ready in: 3 hourshours10 minutesminutes
Ingredients
1 1/4 cups(178g)unbleached all-purpose flour(scoop and sweep to measure)
10Tbsp (141g)unsalted butter,very cold, cut into cubes about 1/2-inch
3 to 4 1/2Tbspice water
Instructions
In a mixing bowl whisk together flour, sugar and salt.
Add butter and cut into mixture using a pastry blender until there are pea size clumps of butter throughout with some larger clumps of butter.
Add water 1 Tbsp at a time and toss well between additions with a rubber spatula. You can even press the mixture together a bit with the spatula as you toss.
Only add enough water for mixture to hold together when you clump a portion of it with your hand.
Pour mixture out onto a clean surface. Flatten and press mixture together then fold the mixture over itself once or twice (it won't be a clean process that's fine, it's just a quick layering for more flakiness).
Compress mixture into a round. Then flatten to about a 6-inch disk. Compress and smooth cracks (you don't want cracks or these will just spread larger as you roll the dough out).
Wrap with a sheet of plastic wrap and chill 1 hour (or up to 2 days. If it chills longer than an hour let it rest at room temperature for about 10 minutes to soften enough to roll).
Remove from fridge and dust a clean work surface generously with flour. Roll dough out to a 13-inch round, while pinching any cracks along the edges together as you roll.
Roll dough up around a rolling pin (I like to dust away excess flour along the edges as I roll it up) then transfer to a 9-inch pie plate.* Unroll the dough over the pie plate starting about an inch beyond one edge. Carefully press the pie dough down into the pie plate to snuggly fit along inner edge.
Leave about 1-inch excess dough around the lip (outermost edge) of pie plate while trimming excess that's over an inch, especially where uneven.
Fold the excess dough along the edges under itself and quickly press together. Flute edges as desired (with your fingers or a tins of a fork).
Drape loosely with plastic wrap to cover and transfer to fridge. Chill at least 1 hour or up to 2 days. Use as directed in your pie recipe.
If blind baking (such as for a cream pie or other no bake filling), set oven rack in center of oven and preheat oven to 375 degrees. Place a baking sheet in oven to preheat.
Crumple up a sheet of parchment paper (large enough to cover the pie), then line the parchment paper along the interior of the pie crust. Fill with pie weights or about 1 lb of dry beans. Trim away tall excess parchment paper.
Place crust on baking sheet in preheated oven and bake until edges are golden brown and sides of crust are starting to dry, about 25 to 30 minutes.
Remove crust from oven then lift out the parchment paper with beans. Pierce crust about 10 times along the bottom with a pairing knife.
Return to oven and bake until crust has dried and is slightly golden brown, about 10 to 15 minutes longer. Tent edges with a pie shield or a ring of heavy duty aluminum foil at any point as needed to prevent excess browning while baking.
Note that every oven browns a little differently. Your crust may not end up quite as golden brown and that's fine as long as it's baked and dried through and crisp.
The dough can also be made in the food processor. Just be very mindful of the size of the butter as every model is different you don't want to pulse it in too much. It should still be visible by the end of mixing.
FOOD PROCESSOR DIRECTIONS
Add flour, sugar and salt to a medium food processor (I use 7 cup size). Pulse 5 seconds.
Add half of the 1/2-inch butter cubes and pulse in 1-second bursts 8 times. Add remaining half of the butter and pulse until they are about 1/3-inch, about 15 to 20 (1-second) bursts.
Drizzle in water 1 Tbsp at a time, adding only enough as needed and pulsing about 3 quick times after each addition.
If you can clump a portion of the dough together and it holds you've added enough water.
Dump dough on clean surface and continue as directed in step 5.