>From: "limey"
>Date: 10/21/03 6:51 AM US Mountain Standard Time
>Message-id: >
>
>
>"Boudica" wrote in message >
>
>> I grew up with this family recipe of a Hot Water Pie Crust & have
>> always wondered why & how this works. Especially since every
>> cooking/baking show I ever watch & book read says it has to be cold
>> throughout.
>>
>> Can anybody who knows about cooking science explain this?
>>
>> Denise, Brian & Wyatt (May 31, 02)
>
>That cold shortening, icewater, keep everything cold puzzles me, too. I
>took Domestic Science in school (same as Home Economics in the US). We had
>no refrigeration so used room-temperature lard, rubbed it into the flour
>with the tips of our fingers, and then used tap water to bind. It always
>came out great. I wonder what method the UK uses now? I also wonder what
>method was used in the US before refrigeration was common?
>
>Dora
>

This article includes a recipe:
http://www.journalofantiques.com/hearthnov.htm


I don't make many pies, but when I do I almost always use a recipe that I found
in one of those "hillbilly" cookbooks. I later discovered the same method in
an old "The Joy of Cooking". It's the flour paste method. You take a portion
of the flour/salt mixture and mix a bit of water into that, then incorporate
the paste back into the flour after you've cut in the shortening/lard.


Agnes