All Butter Pie Crust

All-butter Double-Crust Pie dough mix Makes: enough for 2 double-crust 9-inch pie crusts or 23 mini 4-inch pie shells

5 cups (25 ounces) all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons salt

Mix both ingredients in a large bowl. Store in a container for later or give away.

All-butter Double-Crust Pie dough Makes: enough for one double-crust 9-inch pie

Mixing the sour cream with the water ensured that it was evenly distributed throughout the dough. It was essential to make sure our dough was evenly divided into two even pieces so that the bottom and top crusts were of equal size and could be properly crimped together. When making a lattice crust, it was helpful to freeze the strips of dough briefly to make them easier to handle.

⅔ cup ice cold water, plus extra as needed

6 tablespoons sour cream

1 All-Butter Double-Crust Pie Dough mix

28 tablespoons (3 ½ sticks) unsalted butter, cut into ¼ inch pieces and chilled

Whisk ice cold water and sour cream together in a bowl. Place the mix in a food processor. Scatter chilled butter over top and pulse until butter is the size of small lentils, about 10 pulses. Drizzle half of sour cream mixture over the top and pulse until incorporated, about 3 pulses; repeat with the remaining sour cream mixture.

Pinch the dough with your fingers. If the dough feels dry and does not hold together, add 1 to 2 tablespoons more ice water and pulse until dough forms large clumps and no dry flour remains, 3-5 pulses.

Divide the dough into 2 even pieces. Form each piece into a 4 inch disk, wrap tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour. Before rolling the dough out, let it sit on the counter to soften slightly for about 10 minutes. (The dough can be refrigerated for up to 2 days or frozen for up to 2 months. If frozen, let the dough thaw completely on the counter before rolling.)

Roll 1 piece of dough into a 12-inch circle on a lightly floured counter. Loosely roll the dough around the rolling pin and gently unroll it on to the 9-inch pie plate, letting the excess dough hang over the edge. Ease dough into the plate by gently lifting the edge of dough with your hand while pressing into the bottom with your other hand. Wrap loosely in plastic wrap and refrigerate until the dough is firm, about 30 minutes. 

For A Traditional Top Crust: Roll the second piece of dough into a 12-inch circle on a lightly floured counter, transfer to parchment paper-lined baking sheet and cover with plastic. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

For A Lattice Top Crust: Roll the second piece of dough into a 13 ½ by 10 ½-inch rectangle on a generously floured counter, then transfer to a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Trim the dough to 13 by 10-inch rectangle and slice lengthwise into ten 13-inch-long strips. Separate the strips slightly and cover with plastic. Freeze until very firm, about 30 minutes.

Note: This recipe could be used to make french apple pies, blueberry pie and lemon meringue pie