Dee Randall wrote:

> I'm 71 and I've been afraid to make a pie crust all my life, but have tried.
> I'm still afraid.

Pity. My mother was always a pretty good baker and often made delicious pies.
It was actually my brother who taught me how to make pastry. Good pastry is
good stuff. Bad pastry is not so great, but nothing to be afraid of.

> Also, I've watched foodnetwork for a few years now and none of them have
> convinced me that EYE could make a pie crust, until I saw Ina Garten on one
> of her shows make one in the food processor.

I don't recommend the FP for pie dough. I have tried it and the results were
substandard. I found that it chopped up the shortening too much. It is important
not to work the dough too much and to leave the shortening in chunks. They melt
and sort of fry little layers of the flour mixture, which is what makes pastry
flaky.

> I (we) have made two sets of pie crusts so far. The first was perfect, but
> the second because of my forgetfulness to add, or add enough,
> cornstarch/flour, the bottom inside crust was a little soggy.

Cornstarch???? I use the Crisco recipe... 2 cups o flour and 3/4 tsp. salt, 1
cup Crisco, 1 egg 2 Tbs.. cold water and 1 Tbs.. vinegar. Sift the flour and
salt, cut in the shortening. Beat the egg slightly and mix with water and
vinegar and then stir into the flour mixture until it forms a fall. Cut the ball
in half, form each half roughly into a ball, wrap in wax paper or plastic wrap
and refrigerate 10-15 minutes.

If the pastry is too soggy, just use a little extra bench flour when rolling it
out. The excess flour will be pressed into the dough and absorb some of the
excess water.


FWIW....yesterday I made the best rhubarb pie that I had done in a while. Like
they say, easy as pie. I got home from my riding lesson and mixed up the dough
in 3-4 minutes, turned the oven on and went out to the garden for the rhubarb. I
came back , washed and chopped the rhubarb, mixed it with 1/4 cup flour and 1
cup sugar. Took out the dough and rolled one ball for the bottom crust and lined
the pie pan, then rolled the top crust. I put the rhubarb mixture into the lined
pie pan and dotted with butter, put the top crust on, trimmed, sealed and
folded the edges, then into a 450 degree oven for 5 minutes, turned it down to
375 for another 40 minutes. It turned out great.

The only problem was that my wife would not try it. She is not a rhubarb fan.
She tried a piece of the one I made last week, one that she had ruined by taking
out of the oven too early, before the filling was properly cooked. Pity. This
one is great. OTOH.... more for me :-)