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Dessert

Flake Pie Crust

A flaky pie crust made with flour, shortening, salt, and ice cold water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Flake Pie Crust

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Sift flour and salt together in a bowl.

  2. Add shortening and cut it into the flour using a spatula or two knives until it reaches a crumb stage.

  3. Add cold water and mix by chopping all ingredients together until the mixture forms crumbs.

  4. Flour a board well and pour the crumbs onto it.

  5. Flour your hands and bring the crumbs together in a pyramid shape, squeezing them firmly.

Roll and bake

  1. With a floured rolling pin, roll the dough to your desired thickness, rolling from the center out without turning the dough over.

  2. Handle the dough as little as possible for a flaky crust.

  3. Make the undercrust slightly thicker than the upper crust.

  4. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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

Flour
Forms the structure of the crust once mixed with liquid and rolled.
Shortening
Coats flour particles and creates separate fat layers that make the crust flaky.
Ice cold water
Binds the crumbs into dough while staying cold so the fat stays in pieces.

The step that matters

Handle the dough as little as possible. Overworking develops gluten and warms the fat, which makes the crust tough instead of flaky. Keeping the dough cold and handling it minimally preserves the fat layers that create flakes.

“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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