Try this Gluten Free Pie Crust recipe, or contribute your own.
- Carbohydrate 247.368003567478 g
- Cholesterol 255.200000215733 mg
- Fat 82.6506867365483 g
- Fiber 5.96083353697613 g
- Protein 27.2556500231088 g
- Saturated Fat 45.6281667052407 g
- Serving Size 1 1 pie, including top crust (529g)
- Sodium 4238.7146743806 mg
- Sugar 241.407170030501 g
- Trans Fat 11.8242866766623 g
- Calories 1857 calories
Step-by-step
- SCROLL BELOW RECIPE FOR STEP BY STEP PICTURES.
- In the bowl of your electric mixer, beat together the cream cheese, butter, sugar, and salt.
- Add the flours and xanthan gum.
- Mix it all together with your hands (using your hands is very important. Just get in there and go for it. It’s kind of a nice feeling, really). Don’t over mix. Mix just until the dough comes together. Note: it will take some time for the dough to come together.
- Form into 2 balls, one of which should be slightly larger than the other, and flatten the balls onto 2 separate sheets of plastic wrap. Wrap tightly in the plastic wrap and chill for at least 1 ½ hours.
- Once the dough is chilled, put a sheet of wax paper on your work surface and tape it there so that it doesn’t move around. Dust the wax paper very lightly in cornstarch.
- Put the larger disk of dough on the wax paper and sprinkle the top very lightly in cornstarch. Roll it out until it forms a circle large enough to overlap the edges of your pie plate by quite a bit. You may notice in the pictures that my pie crust doesn’t overlap that much. This is because I used a large pie plate instead of a normal sized pie plate. You’ll have plenty of overlap on a normal-sized pie plate.
- Take the tape off of the wax paper and put the pie plate right next to the rolled out crust. Quickly flip the wax paper, with the crust, into the pie plate. No biggie.
- Peel the wax paper off and move the crust around as necessary to fit it into the pie plate. Don’t cut the overlapping edges off. Instead, tuck them gently underneath themselves so that the jagged edge is hidden. Shape the crust edges.
- Pour the filling into the crust.
- Now for the fun part. Take the other, smaller disk of dough and roll it out on a new sheet of wax paper (also lightly dusted in cornstarch). Lightly dust the crust as necessary so that it doesn’t stick to the rolling pin.
- Roll until the crust is about 12†wide.
- Now, you do want a lattice top, right? If you don’t, just flip the circle of crust onto the top of the pie and shape as necessary.
- But if you do want the lattice top, read on.
- Cut the 12†disk into strips, each about ½â€ wide. Gently lift the first strips up one by one and place it on the pie. Add another few strips, all parallel to the first strip, until the pie is partially covered.
- Then, take a nice long strip of dough and arrange it perpendicular to the other strips, on the very edge of the pie. Gently lift up every other end and slide the strip underneath so that it forms an under/over/under/over pattern.
- Once this is done, gently slide it towards the center of the pie, going slowly so you don’t break any of the strips.
- Once it reaches the center, get another strip and repeat the same process, sliding that strip up until it is just next to the first strip. Cover ½ of the pie and then do the other half in the same way.
- Once you have the entire pie covered, neatly trim the ends and shape them with the edge of the crust, as necessary.
- Refrigerate the pie for about 15 minutes. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- Remove the pie from the refrigerator and coat with egg wash. For information on exactly which egg wash recipe yields exactly the look you want, check out this article. For the pie in the pictures I used an egg yolk/water mix.
- Anyway, cook it for about an hour until the crust is golden and gorgeous. Eat it.
Ingredient measurements alone do not explain why this dough behaves entirely differently from standard pastry, nor do they reveal how the structural matrix forms without gluten strands to trap air and elasticity. Rice flour and cornstarch lack gliadin and glutenin, meaning mechanical binding agents and fats must compensate to prevent a crumbly, sandy disaster. Xanthan gum acts as the essential hydrocolloid binder, mimicking the viscoelastic network of wheat flour by trapping moisture and adding the necessary stretch required to roll the dough out into twelve-inch circles without immediate fracturing.
The Role of Fat and Temperature in Flakiness
Cream cheese introduces both dairy solids and moisture while inhibiting excessive gluten-like protein bonding, resulting in a tender crumb that melts on the tongue rather than chewing like cardboard. Butter cut into quarter-inch cubes creates pockets of steam as water evaporates during the sixty-minute bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit, provided the fat remains solid prior to entering the oven. Chilling the wrapped dough balls for at least ninety minutes solidifies the dairy fats completely, ensuring that the butter does not smear into the flour during rolling and destroy those crucial micro-layers of flakiness. Working efficiently on a cornstarch-dusted surface prevents excessive absorption, keeping the moisture balanced so the crust browns evenly into a deep golden hue.
Managing Lattices and Structural Integrity
Constructing a woven top requires careful temperature management, as gluten-free starches become sticky and fragile when overworked or allowed to warm up too much at room temperature. Refrigerating the fully assembled pie for fifteen minutes before brushing the surface with an egg yolk and water wash firms the butter once more and sets the delicate half-inch strips in place. Sugars in the formulation caramelize alongside the milk solids from the butter and cream cheese, producing complex Maillard reactions that counterbalance the neutral starch profile with deep, toasted notes.
