My mother made the BEST pies EVER!! Her crust was always light and flaky, melt-in-your-mouth, good-to-the-last-bite wonderful. I cannot tell you how many pie crusts I watched my mother make and how many pies my mother baked in her lifetime, but every single time, the crust was pure perfection!! Try as I may, I've never been able to master the art of the pie crust until a woman on a cross stitch message board shared her secret recipe. I've made this a couple of times, and every single crust has been wonderful. Not quite as light and tasty as Mom's but it's a close second.
AuntCarol’s Pie Crust-Never-Fail Type
This pie crust recipe is one that SUPER easy to roll out – one that never gets soggy – leaving that last piece of pie as good as the first – it’s the only pie crust recipe I’ll ever use – it’s the BEST –
Ingredients
1 egg
¾ teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon WHITE vinegar
7 tablespoons water
1 cup shortening (CRISCO)
3 cups flour
BEAT egg.
ADD salt, vinegar, and water.
ADD CRISCO. BLEND with fork, while ADDING flour, about a cup at a time.
FORM into one big dough ball. THEN DIVIDE into 3 equal-sized dough balls (or you can divide it into 2 equal-sized dough balls like I did just today).
ROLL OUT thin on a lightly floured surface and then PLACE into pan of your choice.
Note: Prepared pie shell should be put into the refrigerator 30 minutes before filling – and REMEMBER all fruit pies must be baked on the lowest rack in your oven –
ENJOY -
After you've put your crust into the pie plate, trimmed and fluted it, take all the little leftover pieces and roll them into a ball. Roll out with a rolling pin, cut out shapes with cookie cutters, if you like, or cut into strips, then put onto a piece of foil. Prick the crust with a fork (to allow steam to escape) and sprinkle sugar and cinnamon on the top. Cook at 350ยบ (or whatever temperature your pie recipe calls for) until nice and brown. Some of my fondest memories are when Mom would let us use her cookie cutters and make "pie dough cookies". She also allowed us to decorate the tops however we wanted, with sprinkles, colored sugar, and all those fun baking toppings we didn't use often!!
