Pie Crust II

Hubby lurvesss pies especially apple pie. Every time when we go to the store he'll want to buy an apple pie however he will refrain himself because he knows that I don't really care for it when he buy the pies at the store because is normally full of sugar and is always over priced anyway. I don't really do any baking in the Summer because is already so hot hence I don't really want to increase the heat in the house by baking. However I love to bake in fall, winter and spring because the heat from the over will help warm the house up. Since it's been pretty cool this few weeks I've been keeping myself busy in the kitchen. I've been trying to find/experiment with the pie crust recipes because I want to find a pie crust recipe that will work with sweet pies and meat pies. The reason is when I make my chicken pot pie I like to keep some of the gravy from the chicken pot pie but so far the pie shells (except the ready made once from the store) that I've made will absorb all my gravy thus making my chicken pot pie dry.

So far the Pie crusts have tasted pretty good but I do not dare to try making chicken pot pie with it because I'm afraid it'll be dry. On another note...I absolutely heart my food processor. I had been itching to get a food processor that I could use to make pie dough too and when we were up North after a very very long time of looking I finally decided to get one. I barely use my food processor at that time because I had a small kitchen when I was living up North. When I moved down here I finally decided to use my food processor to make dough but to my horror there was no dough blade! I was really pissed by then because I researched and researched on which food processor to get and I purposely got the Black and Decker Pro II so that I could make dough/pie crust (yes I'm dumb even though I have a KitchenAid mixer sitting on my counter). I was freaking out too because it's been like 1 year plus since I bought the food processor and I didn't think that they would replace the dough blade for me. I made up so many stories in my head so that when they ask me I can tell them smoothly a story but they just asked me some numbers and told me that they would send me the dough blade. At that time I was just relieved (lurvee Black and Decker customer service) but I did complain to hubby that they didn't even question me and I spend so many time thinking of all different stories to tell them and I didn't even have to use them!Anyway I really love how easy to make my pie crust with the food processor. I have been making up batches of pie crust or grinding food and mincing meat with my food processor. Is so convenient!!

Last weekend we looked high and low for little pie pan so that hubs can have little pies (like in the restaurants)

I decided to make a smiley.

Pie Crust
Ingredients
2 C of Flour
1/2 tsp of salt
2 tbsp of sugar (if making sweet pie)
1/2 C of shortening
1/4-1/2C of butter
1/2 C of ice cold water
1.Chill everything you will be using in the fridge/freezer.
2.(Because I'm using my food processor) Put flour, sugar and salt in the food processor and mix it.
3. Add shortening and butter.
4. Pulse it until it resemble like pea size.
5. Add water a table spoon at a time and pulse until it becomes a huge ball.
6. Separate it and wrap with cling wrap. Refrigerate it at least 4 hours or overnight (this process ease the rolling process).

* you want to work the dough as little as possible because the lease you handle the dough the flakier it gets.
** After pulsing several times if it still doesn't stick together I normally just take it out and knead it to a big ball.
***My second batch I didn't have time to refrigerate it and I did have a difficult time to roll it out. If you have a difficult time rolling it and putting it on the pie pan; roll it between parchment paper or cling wrap.

Hubby loves this pie crust but he loves all the pie crust that I've made so far so I would have to see if it works with the chicken pot pie. It's still a keeper anyhow! Everyone wanted a piece of the pie that I didn't even have time to take a picture of it after came out of the oven.