How to Make Good Pie Paste
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Sift the flour into a dish until half full.
In the center of the flour, add the lard and salt.
Squeeze the lard through your fingers, incorporating a little flour each time.
Make the dough
Stir in the cold water with a spoon, adding more flour until the dough can be handled lightly.
Take only enough dough for one crust at a time.
Roll and toss the dough to prevent sticking, avoiding excessive handling.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- All-purpose flour
- Forms the structure of the dough as its proteins hydrate and form gluten.
- Lard
- Coats flour particles to keep the crust tender and flaky by limiting gluten development.
- Cold water
- Binds the flour and fat into a cohesive dough without overdeveloping gluten.
The step that matters
Squeezing the lard through the flour. Keeping the fat in small, flour-coated pieces creates layers that give a flaky crust. Overworking the dough melts or smears the fat and develops gluten, making the crust tough.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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