Mollie Katzen and Her Never-Fear Pie Crust

Making pie crust can bring you joy. Mollie and I promise.

I hate food blogs where you have to scroll for 3 1/2 hours to get to the recipe, but since this is a newsletter and I don’t have to worry about how to make Google love me, I’m putting the recipe for Mollie’s pie crust at the top of the page. Then you can read my musings after.

No-Fear Pie Crust, the Mollie Katzen Way

• Yield: 1 pie crust, enough to line one pie pan. (If you are making a double-crust pie, just, well, double the recipe.)

What You’ll Need:

• A food processor

• 1 1/4 cups (150 grams) all-purpose flour (plus extra for handling the dough)

• Scant 1/2 teaspoon salt

• 1 stick (4 ounces) cold, unsalted butter, cut into slim slices

• 3 to 6 tablespoons ice water

What You’ll Do:

1. Take a deep breath. Know you can do this.

2. Put the flour and salt into the bowl of the food processor and pulse once or twice to blend.

3. Distribute the cold butter slices onto the flour mixture.

4. Pulse in short bursts until the butter is evenly distributed into the flour and the mixture resembles coarse meal.

   

   This is what is meant by “coarse meal.”

5. Sprinkle in 3 tablespoons of the ice water and pulse a few times. The dough should remain in pieces little pieces—in other words, don’t pulse it until it turns into one big clump. Push the dough into itself with a dinner knife or a few fingers to see if it adheres. If still dry and crumbly, add more water, a tablespoon at a time, until it holds together when pinched or pushed. You want minimal water for best results.

   

   See how it smushes?

6. Very lightly flour a work surface. (Cold is best; if you have stone countertops, that's ideal.) Remove the blade from the processor, and push the dough into a disk or ball as you remove it.

7. Place the disk or ball onto the floured surface and pat it down lightly (we don't want too much manual contact because the dough should remain as cold as possible and hands are generally warm). Minimally flour a rolling pin and roll out the dough until it forms a circle. Roll from the middle to just before the edge. To encourage the dough to make a circle, every 2 strokes with the rolling pin, turn the dough a quarter of a turn. Toss some flour under the dough if needed to keep it from sticking and use a pastry scraper or a wide spatula to keep the dough loose on the work surface as you roll.

8. Fold the dough in half, or flip half of it onto your rolling pin and drag into in the pan. Did the dough crack or break? No worries! Just push the pieces of dough together.

9. Trim the the dough so it only hangs over the edge of the pan by about 1 inch. (If it’s more or less in some places, you can steal pieces of dough from one part and stick them where needed.)

10. Crimp the dough to create a pretty edge. Simplest: Use a fork and press gently around the rim of crust. Refrigerate for 30 minutes. If not using immediately, wrap and refrigerate for up to 5 days, or freeze for 3 months.

11. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

How you bake your pie depends on what kind of pie you’re making. This only applies to single-crust pies. If you are making a double crust pie, it is never pre-baked.

PREPARE THE PAN: No matter what kind of single-crust pie you are making, lay a piece of aluminum foil or parchment on top of the dough and weigh that down with dry beans or rice. Make sure the weights are evenly distributed. This prevents the dough from shrinking.

Now, find the follow-on instructions for whatever kind of pie you are making.

FULLY BAKED CRUST (for no-bake pies, like cream pies): Bake until the edges of the pie begin to brown, around 14-17 minutes. Remove the pie from the oven and carefully lift the foil and weights out of the pie. With a fork, prick the bottom of the crust about 8 times to prevent puffing, then return the pie to the oven and continue to bake until crust is golden brown, about 10 -15 minutes. Remove and let cool before filling.

PARTIALLY BAKED CRUST (like for quiche or a pie that will further bake once the filling is added, like pumpkin): Weigh it down as above, then bake until the bottom crust starts to brown, about 7-9 minutes. Remove from the oven. Remove the weights and liner and fill and follow baking instructions for whatever your making.

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In case you haven’t figured it out, the latest episode of my podcast, The Secret Life of Cookies, features—hell, it stars!—Mollie Katzen. Yes, she of “The Moosewood Cookbook” and kid cookbooks such as “Pretend Soup and Other Real Recipes.” Oh and about 11 other cookbooks. And TV shows and and and.

In other words, she knows of what she speaks and she says you never-ever need to fear making pie crust again.

I, no surprise, have spent much of my adult life proselytizing about from-scratch pie dough and baking in general. I’ve also spent my adult life anxious, so understand why something like pie crust, with recipes filled with do’s and don’ts, should and shouldn’ts, can rile one up.

Let’s all take a deep breath together and say: “I can make pie crust. It’s easier than I think. I will do a great job. And my pie crust will be delicious. Much more delicious than Aunt Minerva’s, who always uses a store-bought crust. Mine will taste rich with butter, and be delicate, yet I won’t mind if it breaks into 3 pieces as I put it into the pie pan because I know I can just smush it all together and it will still be great. I am a master!”

Got it?

DON’T PANIC: Say your pie crust falls all apart, and you fall into pieces yourself as a result: Just gather the dough together, and refrigerate it for an hour or so.

Alternatively, roll it out and cut it into cookie shapes, sprinkle with cinnamon sugar and bake at 350 degrees F for 12 to 14 minutes or until golden brown—and remember you like cookies better the pie anyway.

Also: If you have any questions, as a subscriber to this fine newsletter, you can just leave your q’s in the comments and I will respond. You see your refrigerator dough doing that?

With joy, pie crust and eternal thanks to Ms Mollie Katzen,

Marissa xo

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