Not only can you bake rustic looking pies, the crust is melt-in-your-mouth flaky. I had previously thought that homemade pastry was a bit complicated. It isn’t!
Like most things, good things take time.
I don’t have a fancy cake mixer nor any ‘paddle attachments’, so this recipe is made the old fashioned way – by hand.
Blind Baking: Part of the crust process is to ‘blind bake’ it for around 15 mins. This involves covering the pastry once in the pie dish, with aluminum foil or baking paper, then holding it down with baking weights. These need not be fancy purchased weights. I’ve used raw rice and dry beans before.
Crimping Pastry: I pinch the pastry with the thumb and pointer finger of my right hand, and make an indent on the other side using the knuckle of my finger. You can do it any way you choose but that works for me!
Freezing Pastry: Simply wrap up the raw dough in cling film, pop into an air tight container or bag, then freeze. This can be used within several months. Or alternatively once you’ve made the dough, it can keep for several days in the fridge before use (again, wrapped so it doesn’t dry out).
Homemade Flaky Pie Pastry
Ingredients
- 1.5 cups all purpose flour
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 100g chilled butter, cut into small cubes
- 1 egg yolk
- 3-4 Tbsp chilled water
Method
- Sift flour and salt into a mixing bowl. Add butter and using the tips of your fingers, rub the butter into the flour. Don’t get over paranoid – it doesn’t have to resemble breadcrumbs. Chunks of visible butter won’t hurt a bit.
- Add egg yolk and mix in with a knife.
- Add chilled water one tablespoon at a time (you may not need all four tablespoons). Mix water in with a knife. You’ll see the dough starting to clump together in pop-corn sized balls. Ensure there is no flour dust remaining at the bottom of the bowl. Using your hands, gather the dough up together into one large ball, pat down slightly so it resembled more of a disc than a ball, then wrap in cling-film and chill in fridge for one hour.
- The dough will now be nice and firm. On a lightly floured board, using your trusty rolling pin to roll into your desired pie dish shape. For easy transfer from the board to the pie dish, lay the rolled dough over your rolling pin. Cut off any excess pastry around the edges (if you’ve rolled too thin and there’s too much excess you may want to try again with a smaller diameter to avoid paste).
- Pinch the pasty edges to crimp (not completely necessary but looks rustic). Pierce holes in the base of the pastry using a fork as this will help prevent air pockets and bubbles. Put the pastry/pie dish in the fridge for another 30 minutes or longer if you have time.
- Preheat oven to 180°C (160°C fan bake) and blind bake for 15 minutes.
- Carefully remove the foil and weights, then bake for another 10-15 minutes until nicely golden brown.
- Then go prepare your pie filling! Mine was a Grapefruit Meringue Pie!
Happy baking!
