The number 1 most important thing anyone is going to need for their apiecalyptic bunker-y, is the crust. What is a pie without an amazing, flakey, buttery, crunchy, golden brown, not radioactive at all, pie crust? Nothing. The answer is nothing. Now this crust is a mix of methods I’ve learned form pastry chefs that I worked with plus my own little twists on it that I’ve just learned through trial and error. I’m willing to share this with you because it’s the end of the world and what are we besides the memories and lessons we pass on to our kin?

Alright, the very first thing you’re going to want to do is cut up and freeze your butter. You can freeze, shred and then re-freeze your butter if you want. Some people prefer this. I, however, prefer to cut my butter up into little tiny ¼ inch cubes and freeze it. Like this:

I like to try and let my butter freeze for as long as possible, which honestly let’s face it, you’ve got nothing but time now that you’re trapped in your bunker until who knows when. But really, does anyone know when we’ll be able to see the sky again? I don’t and it’s starting to get to me.

Back on topic…it’s important that your butter is at least VERY cold. That way while you’re working with your dough it wont melt. The chunks and layers of butter are basically what gives the crust its flakiness. That is the whole point of the crust in the first place right? ... To have a flaky, porous, filling-sponge? Anyways, the moral of the story is to freeze your butter.

Once your butter is as hard as the giant rock that crashed into earth and killed all the dinosaurs, you can start the actual pie crust making process! Grab that kitchen scale (if you don’t have one that’s OK it’s just so much better and you’ll end up with a more consistent product if you use one) . Weigh out your flour into your bowl first. I use my stand mixer because I’m lazy and technology has provided me with the perfect tool to perpetuate my laziness. Look here’s a picture of the flour all weighed out and pretty!!

make sure it’s EXACTLY 1 lb. of flour or else everything will fall apart like the rest of the world.

Add your salt and sugar in and return the bowl to the mixer. Put on the paddle attachment and give it a brief mix. You just want the salt and sugar to get evenly dispersed into the flour. Once that’s all mixed in and ready, grab that butter from your freezer! Add the butter into the mixer and turn it on the lowest setting. At this stage I always put a towel or something over the mixer because that frozen butter will send flour flying all over the tiny hole in the ground you call home if you’re not careful. Let that mix until you get pieces of butter that are no bigger than a pea.

While you’re waiting for the butter to become pea-sized, combine your liquids in a liquid measuring cup with ice in it. That’s your 6 ounces of water, 1 tsp. of lemon juice, and 1 ½ tsp. of vodka or some other kind of liquor. Maybe it’s just the bathtub gin you’ve made because you already drank all of your supply when you found out the world was ending! It doesn’t matter! As long as it’s some kind of alcohol, it’ll work all the same. The point of the alcohol is basically to add liquid while you’re making the dough that will evaporate and not make your finished product all soggy. No one likes a soggy bottom.

Once the liquids are all combined, and your butter is pea-sized, turn your mixer back on the lowest setting and slowly pour your liquid in. Make sure to keep any ice from falling in, the ice is just there to keep the liquid cold so it doesn’t melt your butter. Once again, it all comes back to keeping that butter cold as ice. Keep mixing until your dough mostly comes together, but there are some dry bits at the bottom.

Heavily flour a surface to work on, and dump your dough out onto it (I make my dough a little more wet than some people so that I can work with a lot of flour and not worry about making the dough too dry). Like this:

Form your dough into a rectangle…like this:

This is the part that gets kind of weird. I like to slightly laminate my pie dough because it creates even MORE delicious, buttery, flakey layers. You could just stop here and refrigerate the dough, but once again, we have all the time in the world so let’s do it the harder way! When I say “laminate” I mean we’re going to fold up the dough a few times then flatten it out then do that again. This process is the basic technique that is used when making things like croissants or puff pastry. I just do a sort of dumbed down version for the pie dough because I’m crazy for those layers (insert drooling emoji here).

Here’s what we’re going to do… once you’ve got your rectangle of dough, we’re going to take the left about 1/3 of the dough and fold it into the middle. Like so:

Then take the remaining right 1/3 of the dough and fold that on top of the other fold, like this:

Then, repeat that whole process again! Flatten it into a rectangle, fold left third, then right third, and then flatten out one last time! This last time it doesn’t have to be as flat as before. Cut your dough block in half and quickly marvel at the beautiful, buttery, strata…

Look at that beauty… wrap each half individually in plastic wrap (or that bees wax wrap stuff which I forgot to stock up on in my bunker). At this stage you can either freeze the dough for up to 6 months, or refrigerate for a couple hours. Once again, this is just to ensure that your butter stays nice and cold. Your dough is done! Congratulations!! That’s it! You can use this recipe for ALL of your crusty needs!

Curious of what the finished product looks like? Take a look…

Note: I’ve egg washed the top of the pie, that’s what gives it the shiny crispy lookin’ texture.

And here’s a stream-lined recipe for those of you who’d like it!

GoodPIE, Cruel World!

Lindsay Miller | August 1st, 2019

prep time: about 30 mins
total time: about 1 hr 30 mins

Servings:

1 full top & 1 bottom crust

Ingredients:

1 # (3 1/3 c.) AP Flour
1 ¾ tsp Salt
1 tsp. Sugar

12 oz. Butter (cubed small and frozen)

6 oz. Ice Water
1tsp. Lemon Juice
1 ½ tsp. Vodka (or other liquor)

Method:

Weigh out dry ingredients into bowl of stand mixer.
Add frozen butter and mix until no piece bigger than a pea remains
Slowly pour in ice water/lemon juice/liquor and mix until just combined. I like to have my dough a little wet so I don’t have to worry about the amount of flour on the table.
Pour dough out onto floured surface, and shape into a rectangle about 1 inch thick.
Fold left 1/3 of dough into middle, then fold the right 1/3 of dough ontop of that.
Press down into a rectangle again and repeat steps 4 & 5 two more times. You should be folding the dough a total of 3 times.
Cut into two even-ish pieces (doesn’t have to be exact)
Wrap in plastic wrap and chill for at least an hour. (dough can be frozen and kept like this for up to 6 months)
Roll dough between two pieces of parchment (or on a heavily floured surface) until it is about ¼ of an inch thick or about 2-3 millimeters.
Place dough into pie tin and leave about a ¾ inch hanging over the edges of the pie tin then add your filling.
If you’re doing a full pie crust on the top or lattice, make sure to egg wash the top edge of the bottom crust so that the top crust will seal with it.