I use this a lot for making quiche (when you have backyard chickens, you make A LOT of quiche!) and there are a number of strictly gluten free people in my life. It’s a high dairy recipe, but the texture is lovely and it holds up well with a heavy filling.
You can also use this for a sweet pie as well, you’ll just want to consider adding some sugar in the crust recipe. If you want to add a top to the pie then 2X the recipe.
Time: 45 minutes active and 2 hours passive
Ingredients:
- 1 1/2C Gluten free flour. I generally use King Arthur or Better Batter. Crucially I like to use GF flour that already has xanthan gum added in the proper proportions. If your GF flour does not have xanthan gum added, you will add 3/4 tsp to this recipe.
- 1/4 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp kosher salt
- 6 Tbs chilled unsalted butter
- 1/2 sour cream measured out and chilled
- Ice water
Unwrap the butter and slice into small cubes, gently separate the cubes, put into a bowl and put back into the refrigerator for at least 20 minutes.
Mix the flour, baking powder, salt together in a large mixing bowl. If your flour does not have xanthan gum added, add it here, but double check because adding extra will make the finished crust very tough.
Add the butter cubes into the dry, and combine by pinching the butter cubes until they start to create a shaggy dough. There should be lots of dry flour at this stage still. Add the sour cream and continue to mix by hand.
Once the sour cream is mixed in, set up your bowl of ice water. Adding 1 tsp of water at a time mix by hand until the dough is reasonably coming together. The key to good pie crust is to not overwork the dough, you want to get the ingredients combined but exhausting the dough will result in a tough and possibly uneven cooking. Do not overwork the dough at this stage.
Lay out plastic wrap on your counter and turn the dough out on to it (or half of the dough if you’ve doubled the recipe). Press the dough into a flat round, making as even as possible, about 1/2-1/4 inch thick. Wrap the round tightly and chill for at least two hours in the fridge, but up to two days.
Once chilled, prepare the 9inch pie pan by buttering heavily with unsalted butter. Dust a pastry cloth or clean dish towel with GF flour and place the unwrapped round on it.
Let dough sit at room temperature for 10 minutes.
Using a rolling pin, starting at the center of the round begin to roll out the dough. It will likely crack to some extent, which is ok in moderation, using a sharp knife trim the edges and use the trimmed pieces to patch any cracks or holes forming in the center. These patches may not affix to the rest of the dough but you want to make sure there are no holes for the filling to escape from when baking.
Using the pie pan as a reference, measure if the dough has been sufficiently rolled out, it should be consistently 1/8inch thick at this point.
Using two spatulas, gently lift the rolled out crust and place it gently into the pie pan. Gently press the crust into the corners of the pan, and flatten against the edges. Using scissors or kitchen shears trim the edges at the top of the pan, if you are keeping the top of the pie open go ahead and crimp the edges using the pads of your fingers to make a wavy edge. If you are using a top piece of crust leave flat for now.
Fill crust with your preferred filling, if adding a top piece of crust, roll out like the bottom, you can cut out shapes with cookie cutters, or do a lattice design. Using a mix of egg yolk and 1 Tbs water, brush the flat edges of the lower crust, place the top piece on, and brush the top with the egg mixture as well.