My Favorite All Purpose Pie Crust
One thing every baker should have in their kitchen is a good large bowl, a rolling pin and a trusty, all purpose pie crust recipe. Something that they can whip up in a pinch, a recipe that can be used for both sweet and savory applications, and a recipe that gets used over and over again for the holidays. This folks, is my version of that. This is My Favorite All Purpose Pie Crust!
This recipe came from my search for a good lard pie crust recipe. It was hard to find since most pie crust recipes use butter or shortening as their source of fat. I liked butter, but I felt that it lacked the flakiness that I wanted. I wasn’t a huge fan of my results from shortening, so I needed to find something else. Being Chinese, I knew that we normally used lard as the fat source in our pastries. It made our crusts light and flakey. It just always provided the perfect texture. So I thought a lard crust was the answer. Yes and no. It gave me a fantastic flakiness and light crust texture, but not enough flavor.
So this recipe combines the two ideas and I have been married to it ever since!
I like using a pastry cutter for pie crust instead of a food processor because it gives me the chance to control how small my fat pieces get processed. With the food processor I feel that it has the chance of becoming too small if you’re not paying attention and you loose that great flakiness. I cut in the butter and the lard till I get small pebbles. Then I add in a mixture of Egg, vinegar and ice water until the dough starts to form and becomes shaggy.
I then turn out half my dough onto a large sheet of plastic wrap. I grab each end of the plastic wrap and schemer the dough together until it comes cohesively together. I for this into a disk and repeat with the other half of the dough. This gets chilled for at least an hour or until your are ready to use!
My favorite All Purpose Pie Crust
Ingredients
3 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup unsalted butter, chilled and cubed
1/2 cup lard
1 large egg
1 tsp apple cider vinegar
6-7 Tbsp ice water
Method
In a large bowl whisk together the flour, salt and baking powder
Using a pastry blender, cut the butter and lard into the flour mixture until it resembles wet sand with pebble like pieces of butter and lard mixed in.
In a large measuring cup, whisk together the vinegar, egg and ice water. Pour the water mixture in with the dry ingredients and mix together with a rubber spatula. Add more water one tablespoon at a time if it seems too dry. The dough should be shaggy and come together when you squeeze it.
Turn the 1/2 the dough out onto a large piece of plastic wrap. Using the ends of the plastic wrap, bring the crumbly dough together by smooshing it on itself. Shape the dough into a disk and wrap in the plastic. Repeat with the other 1/2 of the dough. Refrigerate for at least an hour or until you are ready to use.
To blind bake the crust: Pre heat the oven to 375. Roll out the dough to an 1/8th of an inch and place on your pie tin. Press the bottom and the sides into the tin and cut off any excess edges. Then fold the overhang over and crimp the edges. Refrigerate for another hour.
Place a crumpled piece of parchment in the center of the pie, weigh it down with pie weights or dry rice and beans. Bake for 15- 20 minutes. Then take the pie weights out, prick the bottom of the crust with a fork and place it back in the oven for another 10 minutes. Allow crust to cool. Now you’re ready to fill!