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Listen, I know calling a recipe the World’s Best Pie Crust – or the world’s best anything – is pretty bold. But honestly, there just wasn’t another title that would do it justice. It’s really the best pie crust I’ve ever had. And I’ve eaten a lot of pie. This is the Real Deal.
I love making pie. It’s fun to work with and so visually pleasing, with its little flourishes and golden brown edges. People are often intimidated by making homemade pie crust, but once you get the technique down, it’s actually pretty simple. And it’s SO much better than store-bought crust.
Pie crust is traditionally made with flour, salt, liquid, and fat. The fat typically comes in one of two forms: 1) shortening/lard, which produces a tender, flaky but somewhat bland dough, or 2) butter, which provides lots of flavor but can result in a drier dough that requires more water and therefore more manipulation, making it harder to roll out and potentially tougher in texture. Some people combine the two fats to get the best of both worlds, or use other tricks to get the perfect flavor-texture balance. For years, I used a recipe I found in the newspaper that used shortening for flakiness and brought in flavor with vinegar and brown sugar mixed with water. And it was great. It got raves. But in general, I really prefer butter over shortening, so I kept seeking.
I stumbled across this recipe in the Serious Eatsarchives. The ingredients, as compared to a traditional pie crust recipe, are unremarkable – flour, butter, salt, water, a little sugar. The key is in the way they’re combined. As the author notes, when you completely blend two-thirds of the flour with all the butter to create a paste, and then add the remaining flour, you are essential creating an environment in which the formation of gluten is controlled (which is key to the texture of the crust). Additionally, the fat is evenly distributed, and you end up with a consistent, easy-to-roll-out dough every time. If, like me, you enjoy geeking out on the science behind this technique, check out the original article. But the beauty of this recipe is that you really don’t need to understand the how or why. The technique takes care of the details such as how much to work in the flour and how much water to add – all the fretting is already handled for you. Just follow the recipe and let the flaky gorgeousness happen.
To fully combine the ingredients, I find it’s easiest to start this dough in a food processor (you’ll transfer it to a bowl later to add the water). Alternatively, a stand or hand mixer will work. You can use a pastry cutter or other manual method to make the butter/flour paste, of course – just expect a good arm workout. You really have to work the butter in completely.
The result is the lightest, flakiest, buttery-est crust I’ve ever had. World’s Best Pie Crust! I’m telling you. I think it’s recipe magic and I actually kind of can’t believe it came out of my kitchen. I hope it’s the best in your world, too.
World’s Best Pie Crust
★★★★★4.6 from 11 reviews
- Author: Adapted from recipe by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, Serious Eats
- Prep Time: 15 min
- Total Time: 15 minutes
- Yield: 2 single crusts 1x
- Category: sweets, entrees, breakfast & brunch
Description
This buttery, flaky, easy-as-playdough to roll out pie crust recipe will eradicate all of your pie-related angst and make you look like a pastry expert.
Ingredients
Scale
2 1/2 cups (11 ounces) all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
2 tsp sugar
2 1/2 sticks (10 ounces; 20 TB) cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/4-inch pieces
6 TB cold water
Instructions
Add 1.5 cups (6.5 oz) of the flour (reserving the other cup), along with salt and sugar to food processor and pulse briefly to combine. Scatter butter pieces evenly over the flour and pulse until the flour is completely incorporated and the paste-y mixture begins to clump together (this can take a minute or two). Use a spoon to even out the paste in the bowl of the food processor and add the remaining cup of flour. Pulse until incorporated, then transfer the dough to a medium bowl.
Sprinkle the 6 TB of water over the dough and slowly work it in with a spoon (or better, your hands) until it’s absorbed. The dough will be sticky! Remove dough from bowl, divide evenly into two parts, and shape into disks. Wrap each disk in plastic wrap and chill for an hour or two (can be chilled longer, or, if double-wrapped, frozen for up to 3 months). Remove the dough from the fridge and let it rest at room temperature for a few minutes, then roll out to 1/4 inch thickness on a floured surface, using as little flour as possible to avoid toughening the dough.
To pre-bake the crust (as for a cold filling), place rolled out dough in pie plate, then trim to fit with scissors and crimp edges with fingers or a fork. Prick the bottom of the crust all over with a fork (to prevent bubbling), place a layer of parchment paper on top of it, and fill with pie weights or dried beans. Bake @ 375° for 20 minutes, then remove weights and parchment and return to oven for an additional 15-20 minutes, until crust is golden brown.
Notes
… Use cold butter and water. It keeps the dough from getting greasy.
… If using a food processor, don’t add the water to the mixture there. It gets unpleasantly goopy and can result in over-worked dough (experience talking here). It’s worth the extra step of blending it in slowly by hand.
… If you end up with lots of scraps after rolling out and trimming your dough, don’t throw them away! You can use cookie cutters to add decorative shapes on top of your pie, or brush them with melted butter and sprinkle cinnamon and sugar on top (delicious crumbled on ice cream or eaten like cookies).
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