The importance of crust

My boyfriend's 30th birthday was the inspiration for my first home-made pie.  Even though I had a made a few pies with my younger sister in the past, I had never once made crust from scratch.  I always thought that the crust was the least important part of the pie and that I could get away with not having one that was entirely homemade. Boy was I wrong.

For my 26th birthday my sister had bought me the cookbook Mad Hungry: Feeding Men and Boys.  In the back there were some dessert recipes, and the very first recipe was for pie crust.  I read it over and it didn't seem that complicated, so I decided to test it out and make a pie one week before my boyfriend's birthday.  I didn't want to risk a disaster pie on his actual birthday, so I set to work getting together all the ingredients.

Ben & Me

Here is the recipe I used and some helpful tips I've discovered as I've made my pie crusts.

Ingredients:

2 cups of all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon of salt
2 sticks of butter
1/4 cup cold milk

Directions:

Add the flour and salt together.  Then cut in the 2 sticks of butter.  To do this, unwrap the 2 sticks and slice them very thinly.  Do not melt the butter at all.  It should be right out of the fridge.  Add the slices of butter to the flour/salt mixture and use your hands to mix.  Keep mixing till you have a crumbly consistency.  Then add the 1/4 cup of cold milk and continue to mix until the dough sticks together in a ball. 

Separate the dough into two circular disks and wrap them in plastic wrap.  Refrigerate for a minimum of 15 minutes.  I prefer to make the dough the day before I plan on making a pie.  It breaks up the amount of time you spend working on it and the dough tends to taste better if it's been refrigerated a little longer.  However, do not use the dough if it has been sitting in the fridge for more than 3 days.

When you are ready to use the dough, take out some flour and a rolling pin. Flour the cutting board and rolling pin and roll out one of the disks.  Once it is rolled out to the size of your pie pan, place it in the pan and press the dough firmly against the sides.  Try to make sure there is an even consistency of dough through out the pan.  Before adding the filling to the crust, brush an egg white on the bottom of the crust.  This will keep the filling from sticking or burning. 

After you add the filling to the bottom crust, roll out the second disk of dough.  Cut the dough into strips and criss cross it over the top of the filling.  I prefer to criss cross the dough instead of lie it all flat on top.  Not only does this allow for more ventilation, but it makes the pie more pleasing to the eye.  You can see the filling inside and that makes everyone want to eat it!