The Fourth of July is coming up, and I’m thinking about pies. I come from a long line of pie-makers. Seriously, my Grandma’s rolling pin has undergone some serious mileage. My Mom made pies, my Aunts made pies and they taught me to make pies. I’ve made cherry, apple, pumpkin, chocolate pecan, blueberry, and peach pie.
While I have made quite a few pie crusts in my life, I have never quite mastered cutting the butter into the flour while you make the crust. Honestly, I usually cheat and purchase ready made pie crusts for this reason. They are so close to homemade – but homemade is still so much better. So, one day I thought…what if I used a cheese grater for the butter? (Just an an FYI, apparently other people have discovered this but I can honestly say I discovered this on my own and later found out other people have done it too.) So here’s what I did:
Homemade Pie Crust Hack
Step 1 – Gather all your ingredients.
You will need:
Ingredients
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup plus 2 tablespoons butter
4 to 6 tablespoons cold water
Step 2: Grate the Butter
Once you have all of your ingredients out and measured and ready to go, grab your cheese grater and grate your butter as you would cheese. It will look like this:
Step 3: Mix the all the ingredients.
Step 4: Separate into two balls.
Step 5: Roll out.
Step 6: Unroll into a pie pan.
Step 7: Fill with fruit or other filling. (To find out the epic story where these blueberries came from, click here. )
Step 8: Place top on , cut slits. Trim excess, and save. Seal and flute.
Step 9: Bake! Baking time will vary depending on which filling you choose. I like Betty Crocker’s recipes for pie.
Bonus Recipe
Now, what to do with that extra pie crust…
Do what my mom always did, make mini pie crust cinnamon rolls!
Momma’s Pie Crust Cinnamon Rolls
My mom would make these delicious morsels with leftover pie crust. This recipe is not an exact science. Just use however much looks right to you. I use a tablespoon or two of butter, depending on how much pie crust I have to spread it on.
Ingredients
Leftover pie crust
Sprinkle of cinnamon
Sprinkle of sugar
Some melted butter
Directions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees, or stick in in with the pie and have a separate timer. Roll out extra pie crust into a rectangle. Use flour as needed to keep pie dough from sticking.
- Melt butter.
- Spread butter over pie crust.
- Sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar.
- Roll starting starting from a long end.
- Slice 1 inch pieces of dough. Place in a pan or oven-safe dish swirl-side down.
- Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes or until slightly browned.