Since I was a pre-teen, it has been a tradition in my family that I made the pies for Thanksgiving. My father’s favorite was pecan, which my mom didn’t like to make. Family lore was that she had eaten a slice of pecan pie at Carlsbad Caverns and become violently ill afterwards, and couldn’t stand to look at a pecan pie forever after. Mom made great pumpkin pie, but hated making crusts so she would buy those frozen things that were okay, but kind of thick and chewy.
With Mom somewhat overwhelmed with Thanksgiving dinner preparation, and not being particularly enamored with the baking chores, it fell to me to become the Pie Guy. The tradition continued after I left home, my parents divorced (I once sent a fresh pecan pie to my dad via FedEx overnight), through having children of my own and making a new family.
Now I have a new home far from my adult children. I’m finding a new family here on the island. When several of us decided to get together for Thanksgiving, I volunteered out of habit to be the Pie Guy. Of course, pies require crust, so yesterday and today I made pie crust. I’ll do the fillings tonight or tomorrow morning. The turkey is already in our host’s oven, so I won’t be able to bake the pies until it comes out tomorrow.
For the past couple of decades, I’ve been using an unusual pastry recipe that uses lemon juice and egg. Give it a try!
pastry crust
ingredients
- 3 c (384 gm) flour
- 1 c frozen butter or lard
- 3 tb lemon juice
- 1-3 tb cold water
- 1 egg, beaten
- 1 tsp salt
directions
Put several tablespoons of flour into a food processor. Cut each frozen butter stick in quarters and put in food processor with blade. Pulse repeatedly until you have baby-pea size lumps. Toss in with flour using a fork. Gently add lemon juice, water, egg and salt. Toss just until blended.
Use the minimum amount of water to get the dough to just start stick together. Too little and the dough will be crumbly and hard to work. Too much and the dough will be thick and tough. Experience is the only teacher, but in my experience with King Arthur flour I usually need 3 tablespoons of cold water. To keep the crust flaky, make sure everything is cold and don’t handle the dough too much.
Divide in two, form into balls, wrap and refrigerate for a couple of hours (overnight is better). Roll out and line pie tin.
Need a pre-baked crust? Cover with foil leaving rim clear, pour in dried beans, bake at 425° for 20 minutes or until exposed rim is brown
—2p
addendum 20241128@12:35 — the results
