Perfect Pie Dough: A FREE Virtual Cooking Class from Feed Your Soul
Developing a Flaky Pie and Tart Crust
Flaky pie or tart dough, or Pâte Brisée is a member of the “cut-in” family of pastries, requiring a technique similar to biscuits and scones. This method of mixing cuts the butter into pieces that remain separate from the flour. Once liquid is added to the mixture, a dough forms, surrounding the butter pieces, keep whole within the dough. As the dough is rolled, the butter pieces are flattened into disks. During baking, the dough sets around these disks. As the disks melt, they leave behind an empty space in the hardening dough, creating the texture of a flaky crust.
What is in a Flaky Crust?
Flour
For pie dough, the two key attributes of flour are protein and water absorption. Protein, when combined with liquid (such as the water in pie dough) and agitation (such as stirring, kneading, and rolling) forms strands of gluten. In bread, you want lots of gluten structure; in cakes, very little; and in pie dough, you want just enough. Enough to provide shape, flakiness, and strength to your dough without making it tough. Pastry flour has more protein than cake flour and less protein than all-purpose or bread flour. Pastry flour can be hard to find. You may substitute with cake, all-purpose, or a mix of both as in your recipe.
Butter
Butter not only adds the best flavor possible to your pie crust, it also browns and crisps the crust better than other fats. Many people swear by shortening in their crust because its high melting point means there is more time for the dough to set around the disks of fat, ensuring a very flaky crust. However, proper technique with the butter dough will produce a flaky crust with a much better flavor. When choosing butter, quality counts. Purchase a nice, unsalted butter of a high quality. Avoid salted butter, which will make your crust too salty.
Sugar
Sugar, added to this dough in very small amounts, contributes a subtle sweetness and helps give the dough a lovely golden brown color. It is optional and should be omitted if you are making a savory pie or tart.
Salt
Salt enhances flavor. Without it, your crust will taste flat. When it’s there, you don’t notice it, but when it’s missing, the crust is not as delicious. I use kosher salt crushed with my fingers or a fine sea salt.
Water
Water blends with the flour, activating its proteins and helping to create the gluten strands necessary for proper structure. Since flours vary in their protein and moisture content, it can be difficult to specify an exact amount of water. Humidity plays as part since flours absorbs moisture from the air. Bleached flour will also absorb less water than unbleached. Add just enough water to form a crumble dough, but not so much that the dough is sticky and difficult to work with. Always add the lowest measurement of water first then add more, about a teaspoon at a time, until the dough is finished. I use ice water because cold water helps keep the butter firm.
Acid
Sometimes a recipe calls for the addition of a small amount of acid to the dough, such as a teaspoon of lemon juice or vinegar in flaky pie crust recipes. The theory is that the acid breaks up the long gluten strands and guards against toughness caused by the development of too much gluten during mixing and kneading. My research has found that one or two teaspoons is not enough acid to reduce gluten formation. To do so, you would need to add so much lemon juice or vinegar that the dough would not be tasty. However, if your grandmother added vinegar or vodka to her pie crust, add it. It won’t hurt the dough and tradition and proper techniques make great pie/tart crust.
How to Make Flaky Crust Every Time
Mix the Dry Ingredients
Measure the flour, sugar, and salt into the bowl of a food processor and blend well. You don’t have to use a processor to make the dough, but it is a fast and efficient way to cut the butter into the flour, producing perfect-size butter pieces in seconds.
Cut in the Butter
The most important thing to remember when making all-butter pie dough is to keep the butter cold. The drawback to using butter is its low melting point (about 94°F), which means that the heat from your fingers can melt the butter, allowing it to blend with the flour during the mixing and rolling stages rather than remaining separate. If there’s no separation, there are no flakes. So, keep it cold. Cut the butter into pieces and freeze them for 20 minutes before beginning and use a food processor to cut in the butter quickly. Add the frozen butter pieces to the processor and pulse (1 second each) until the mixture looks shaggy and resembles crushed crackers. It is easy to go too far, so check the texture every 3 or 4 pulses. Another reason to use the processor is that its speed means the butter will stay cold as long as possible. You can cut the butter into the flour by hand using your fingers or a pastry blender, but remember to work quickly and set the bowl in the refrigerator if the butter begins to soften.
Add the Water
Many recipes say the butter should be cut into pea size pieces before adding the water. I prefer larger pieces. As you pulse in the water, you also continue to cut the butter into smaller and smaller pieces. If you start with larger pieces, you will end with pea sizes once all of the water is added. Remember butter disks when rolling are the key to a flaky crust. Test for moisture content as you add your water (see below). Too little water and the dough will be crumbly and difficult to roll. Too much water and the dough will be sticky and shrink in the oven.
Test the Dough
Grab a handful of shaggy crumbs and squeeze them together in your hand. When you open your fingers, the dough should hold together in a moist, but not sticky, mass. The dough should release easily from your hand. If clumps of dough or patches of flour fall through your fingers, the dough needs more water. If the dough tests too wet and sticky, it is best to begin again. By the time you add enough flour into the dough to achieve the right consistency, the gluten will have strengthened, and the dough will be tough. Your butter pieces will also become too small. You can always add more water, therefore, err on the side of dryness.
Knead the Dough
Turn the dough clumps out onto a lightly floured surface and gently knead them together. It will take between 3 and 6 kneads to bring the clumps into a dough. If it crumbles or falls apart, it’s still too dry. Place the dough in a mixing bowl and add additional cold water. If at any time during the pie making process you notice that the butter is getting soft or squishy, immediately stop what you are doing and transfer the mixture to the refrigerator or freezer for 15 minutes to firm it up again. I use a silicone rolling mat when making crust. If at any time I need to transfer my dough, I can easily transport the mat into the fridge or freezer.
Chill the Dough
Wrap the finished dough in parchment or plastic and refrigerate for 30 minutes. This resting time allows the gluten strands to relax and the dough to finish hydrating. Plus, it firms up the butter. Shape the dough into a round and flatten to about ¾ inch thick. If you have a square or rectangular pan, shape the dough into a square rather than a circle. The correct beginning shape make rolling the dough easier into the desired finished product. After the 30 minutes, follow your recipe as directed.
Flaky Pie Dough
Yield: 1, 9-inch pie shell
4 ounces cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
3 to 4 tablespoons cold water
1/4 cup unbleached pastry or cake flour*
1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1-1/2 teaspoons granulated sugar (omit for a savory crust)
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
Place the butter pieces in a bowl or on a plate and freeze for at least 20 minutes. Refrigerate the water in a small measuring cup until needed. Place the flours, sugar, and salt in the bowl of the food processor. Process for 10 seconds to blend the ingredients. Add the frozen butter pieces and pulse 6 to 10 times (in 1-second bursts), until the butter and flour mixture looks like crushed crackers and peas. Immediately transfer the butter-flour mixture to a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Add a tablespoon of the cold water to the mixture and stir on lowest speed. Repeat until 3 tablespoons have been added or until mixture resembles shaggy crumbs and clumps of dough. You may not use all 3 tablespoons of water. Test dough by pinching crumbs together. If the butter feels soft, refrigerate before continuing. If the butter is cold and firm, continue. Turn the dough onto a silicone pastry mat or clean counter and knead gently 3 to 6 times. Flatten into a 6- or 7-inch disk, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate dough for 30 minutes.
Dust your pastry mat or counter and top of dough lightly with flour. Roll, turning the dough and following the directions above, until you’ve got a 14- to 15-inch circle about 1⁄8-inch thick. If dough becomes warm and sticky, refrigerate for 15 minutes, or until the butter is firm again. Roll dough on to the rolling pin and unroll into the center of the pie pan, tart pan, or baking sheet. Using a pair of kitchen scissors or paring knife, trim the dough by 1 1/2-inches over the pan’s edge. Fold overhanging dough under itself around the pan edge, then crimp or form a decorative border. Chill for at least 30 minutes before baking.
Chef Tip: The dough can be wrapped in plastic and refrigerated for up to 2 days, or double-wrapped in plastic, slipped into a freezer bag, and frozen for up to 1 month.
*You may substitute 1/4 cup all-purpose flour for pastry flour.
Equipment:
refrigerator and freezer
pastry cutter, optional
9-inch pie pan
rolling pin
rolling pin bands, optional
pie weights, optional
kitchen sheers or paring knife
silicone pastry mat, optional
Shopping List:
4 ounces (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
3 to 4 tablespoons cold water
1/4 cup unbleached pastry or cake flour, optional see notes
1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
1-1/2 teaspoons granulated sugar (omit for a savory crust)
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
Do Before Class:
cut butter into 1/2-inch pieces, store in fridge, place in freezer 20 minutes before class
store water in fridge, place in freezer 20 minutes before class
Measure out ingredients
Have tools and equipment within reach
Review recipes and have questions ready!