SC - Hot water pie crust

[Decker, Terry D.]

I've the fat and hot water dough in recipe 61 a couple of times, using a 1/4
cup of butter to 1/4 cup of water.  I've made it with all purpose flour and
with cake flour, but I used them different ways so there is no real
comparison as to which works best.  The cake flour requires more flour and
does not get as stiff as the all purpose flour.

For the latest experiment, I used 2 cups of cake flour sifted with 1
teaspoon of salt and 2 eggs mixed into it.  After which,1/4 cup of butter in
1/4 cup of water brought to a boil then removed from the stove and the
butter allowed to melt was added and stirred in.  The resulting dough was
then worked with additional flour until smooth. 

Unchilled, I found the dough to be a little sticky, needing a well floured
surface for rolling.  After 30 minutes in the refrigerator the dough was
easy to handle and rolled out well on a lightly floured surface.

Rolled thin, it is a nice dough for Krapfen.  I used it with Sabina
Welserin's recipe for Shrove Tuesday doughnuts (173).  It fries well.

As a tart shell, I pre-baked it and found it to be a little tough and
over-done.  The next time I will not pre-bake.  I found the dough superior
to the egg, flour and water pie shells I have experimented with previously.

I too would like to try this with lard, although I will probably make it
with meat broth from lamb shanks first.

Bear   

> Has anyone (Bear, for instance?) tried the hot water method for making pie
> crust mentioned in Sabina Welserin? She's got two kinds of tender crusts,
> one that uses eggs and at least a couple of mentions of crust that starts
> by dissolving the fat in boiling water. That goes against everything my
> mother (best pie baker in the world) taught me.
> 
> But yesterday I decided to give it a try. I dissoved 3/4 cup of shortening
> (next time I'll try lard) in about 1/2 cup of boiling water, stirred it
> until it was thoroughly mixed and then added flour. It took about 2 cups
> of
> flour to get the right consistency. I let the dough chill for a few hours.
> After warming it up to room temperature, it handled just fine, rolled out
> quite easily. The finished product was quite tender.
> 
> Valoise
> 
> 
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