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24 Hoosier Mama

A l l B u t t e r P i e D o

u g h

This is the most important recipe at the pie shop. It is thesecret to ninety percent of the pies we make, both sweet and savory. New bakers arent considered

full members of the pie team until they master it.

sticks unsalted butter, divided g

Tablespoon red wine vinegar g

cup ( mL) cold water g

cups all-purpose our g

teaspoons kosher salt . g

Tablespoon granulated sugar . g

Once the dough is rested, it can be stored in the re-frigerator for up to 3 days, or frozen for up to 1 week.

At the pie shop we use disposable aluminum pietins, a practical necessity Im still not com- pletely happy with. I prefer basic, old-fashioned,tinned-steel pie plates, but the returnable pietin program we had early on failed spectacular-ly, as we ran through all our tinned steel pansin two weeks with only a handful of returns.I like the pans because they are relativelyinexpensive (if you are not stocking a pie com- pany!), transfer heat well, and produce a nicelybrowned bottom crust. Look for pans with gener-ous rims to support a nice deep crimp. I haventhad much luck with nonstick versions; I usuallyend up scratching the nish.

We lightly coat our pie tins with canola-

based cooking spray and dust them with our,much like you would grease and our a cake pan. Pie slices lift out easier, cleanups faster,and some pies, like custards or chess pies, canbe lifted out of the tins whole and transferred to prettier plates for serving.

PIE TINSMakes one double-crust pie

or two single-crust pies

Ingredients

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1Cut the butter into -inch (13-mm) cubes. Freeze 5 tablespoons (70g) for 20 minutes or overnight; chillthe remaining 1 sticks in the refrigerator until ready to use.

2 Stir the red wine vinegar into the cold water and set aside.

3 Combine the our, salt, and sugar in the bowl of a food processor and pulse 5 or 6 times to combine.

4 Add the chilled butter and mix for 25 to 30 seconds, until the mixture resembles coarse meal.

5 Add the frozen butter and pulse 15 to 20 times, until the butter is in pea-sized pieces.

6 Add 6 tablespoons of the vinegar water and pulse 6 times. The dough should start to look crumbly. Testthe dough by squeezing a small amount in the palm of your hand. If it easily holds together, it is done. Ifnot, add tablespoon of the vinegar water and pulse 3 more times. Repeat this process as needed untilthe dough holds together.

7 Transfer the dough to a lightly oured work surface and knead together until smooth; dough shouldnever come together in the food processor.

8 Divide the dough into 2 equal parts and roll each into a ball. Flatten the balls slightly and wrap sepa-rately in plastic wrap. Let the dough rest in the refrigerator until ready to use, at least 20 minutes butpreferably overnight.

THYME DOUGH VARIATION

We use thyme dough for our Chicken Pot Pie (p. 262), because thyme and chicken taste great to-

gether. The ecks of thyme make an attractive crust and with so many different pies at the shop, it

helps us tell them apart! Simply take teaspoon (about 4 sprigs or .75g) of fresh thyme, remove and

discard the stems, and roughly chop the leaves. Add it to the food processor along with the other

dry ingredients in step 3. You can also try mixing in another herb like sage, or a spice like freshly

ground black pepper.

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BLIND BAKING

Blind baking is a funny-sounding term that simply means baking a pie shell prior to lling it.

Though it has been a part of kitchen-speak for centuries, no one has any idea where the term came

from. Lately, pre-baking has taken its place in contemporary recipes, and while it is certainly more

descriptive, at Hoosier Mama we prefer the traditional term. Use blind baking condently in a

sentence and you get automatic membership in the secret society of pie makers!Blind baking is used for pies like Chocolate Cream (p. 141), where the lling is not cooked in the

pie shell, and for quiches and some custards, where the shell needs to bake longer than the lling. We

also blind bake the shells for pies like Pumpkin (p. 149) or Hoosier Sugar Cream (p. 171), where the pie

lling bakes for up to an hour in the pie shell. We nd it keeps the bottom crust from getting soggy.

In blind baking, pie shells are lined with parchment paper and lled with weights to keepair pockets from forming as the shells bake. You can buy ceramic weights or stainless steel pie

chains at specialty cooking stores, but dried pinto beans are inexpensive and work just as well. At

the shop, we line the shells with 13x5-inch (32.5x12.5-cm) coffee lters instead of parchment paper;

they t the 9-inch (22.5-cm) crimps perfectly and let air ow through to the bottom crust. Dont use

foil or wax paper; foil blocks airow, resulting in a tough, dense bottom crust, and the coating on

wax paper will burn and smoke in a hot oven.

1 Preheat the oven to 400F (200C).

2 Place a frozen, crimped pie shell on a baking sheet. Line the inside of the shell with parchment paper ora coffee lter. Fill with uncooked beans until the beans are even with the top edge of the crimp. Press

down on the beans to make sure they spread to the edges of the shell.3 Bake for 20 minutes, rotating 180 degrees halfway through. The outer edge of the crimp should be dry

and golden brown.

4 Remove the shell from the oven and carefully remove the parchment paper/coffee lter full of beans. Ifthe paper sticks to the pie, bake it for 3 more minutes and try again. Once the parchment paper or coffeelter is removed, prick the bottom of the shell all over with a fork. Bake for 3 more minutes, until theinterior of the shell is dry and light golden brown.

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We use large coffee lters lled with dried pinto beans to blind bake.