All Butter Pie Crust

 
 
 
 

Everyone needs a perfect pie crust recipe in their kitchen arsenal, and this one is it. Developed by Kate Lebo, local writer and pie baker extraordinaire, this crust doesn’t require any fancy tools or ingredients, while the variety of butter chucks make an effortlessly flakey crust. We love using this crust for all of our pie-crust needs because it really is the best, why reinvent the wheel? —Ju

 

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups flour

1 Tbsp sugar

1 tsp salt

1 cup (2 sticks) well- chilled butter

 

Instructions

  1. Fill a spouted liquid measuring cup with about 1 1/2 cups of water, add a couple of ice cubes and place in the freezer while you’re preparing the next couple of steps. This is more than enough water than you will actually actually use for this recipe, but since we add the water based on the look and feel of the dough, there isn’t any exact amount. You will probably end up using about 1/2 cup of water in the end.

  2. In a large bowl mix together the flour, sugar and salt.

  3. Cut 1/2 to 1 inch cube pieces of the butter and drop them in the flour mixture; toss to evenly coat all butter pieces with flour.

  4. With your hands facing up, loosely scoop up some flour and butter mixture in your hands and rub the butter pieces between your thumb and fingers, letting the flattened pieces fall back into the bowl. Repeat this process, reaching into the bottom and around the sides to incorporate all of the butter into the flour. The mixture should eventually become slightly yellow (from the butter) and should remain mostly chunky; there should be some almond, some cherry and mostly pea sized pieces left. The rest of the mixture should resemble course cornmeal.

  5. Take the water out of the freezer and pour into the bowl in a steady, thin stream for about 5 seconds. Toss the flour mixture to distribute the moisture. You’ll probably need to add a little more water and toss again. Pay attention to the dough at this point - as it gets close to being done, it will become shaggy, slightly tacky and begin to hold together more. By the end you want the dough to just hold together when pressed into a ball - ere on the side of adding only a small amount of water at a time as you can always add a little bit more, but you can’t take water away!

  6. With brief, firm pressure, gather the dough into 2 roughly equal balls, quickly form the balls into thick disks and wrap individually in plastic wrap. Refrigerate for at least an hour or up to 3 days before rolling. Dough can also be made in advance and frozen - be sure to let the dough chill for an hour in the fridge before wrapping and freezing. Use this all-butter crust for all of your pie, gallete and tart needs!

Makes 1 double crust.