Updated 11.21.21.
The first time I used this crust was when my coworker Matthew had extra pie dough and gave it to me to use. Use I did in my most amazing Sweet Potato Pie, though this recipe (as published in the L.A. Times) is recommended as a savory pie crust, not as a sweet pie crust. Over time, I have use this pie crust in myriad different pie recipes. Personally, I think this layered and flaky croissant-like pie crust is perfect for a pot pie. It’s fun to watch the crust poof as it bakes.
That being said, I put the dough together a bit differently than the directions below. Typically to get a flaky pie crust, you want to use cold butter and this recipe calls for room temperature. So I use room temperature cream cheese, mixed with cream, salt and flour and then cut chunks of butter into the flour mixture. You can then see thin discs of butter when you roll out the pie crust; this is what makes a crust flaky – the butter creates thin layers in the crust.
You have to be careful using this method though. For one of my recent pie crusts, I rolled it out so thin on one side, I didn’t notice that the only thing holding the pie dough together in a spot was butter. When I baked the crust, there ended up being a hole in one spot!
Additionally, it might seem as though there is a lot of dairy in this recipe between 8 ounces of cream cheese and 8 ounces of butter. I can’t recall a time I have ever baked this pie crust without any ingredients, i.e. use it for a cream pie. When doing this, you have to put some foil in the pan and use pie weights to weigh it down so it doesn’t puff while cooking. Then eventually you remove the foil (and the weights) and continue cooking the crust until brown. At the time that I removed the foil and the weights, there was a disturbing amount of butter just sitting on top of the bottom of the pie crust. Luckily the butter seeped back into the pie dough as it continued to cook to get those sort of separated layers.
You may not want to try to get that adventurous and just stick with the recommended directions below!
ingredients.
- 1 8-oz container cream cheese, at room temperature
- 1 c. (2 sticks) butter, at room temperature
- ¼ c. cream
- 1 tsp. salt
- 11 ½ oz flour
directions.
- In a large bowl, beat together the cream cheese and butter until light and fluffy, then stir in the cream and salt until combined.
- Stir in the flour, a little at a time, using a fork. Handling as little as possible, shape the dough into a disk. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate until chilled and firm, at least one hour, up to overnight.
Makes enough dough for 1 double-crust (9-inch) pie or 6 individual hand pies
Recipe rating:
Food Snob 