Easy Peasy Gluten Free Pie Crust
(makes one double crust pie, or two single-crust pies)
INGREDIENTS:
150 grams cornstarch
150 grams tapioca starch
100 grams brown rice flour
8 grams salt
4 grams xanthan gum
225 grams shortening
125 grams ice-cold water
INSTRUCTIONS:
1. Measure out all of your ingredients before you start and chill the water with ice cubes. Whisk the dry ingredients together in a large mixing bowl.
2. ‘Cut’ the fat, in this case shortening, into the flour. This simply means that you are going to mix the fat into the flour by pinching and rubbing the shortening into the flour with your fingers until the flour is the consistency of cornmeal.
3. Remove the ice cubes from the water, and then drizzle 125 grams over the flour. Mix the the dough together until it forms a smooth ball. I do this with my hands, but you could also a food processor.
4. Divide the dough into two. Wrap each half with plastic wrap, and flatten it into a thick disc. Refrigerate the dough for a minimum of two hours, or as much as a couple of days.
5. Remove the crust from the refrigerator. Place the disc of dough on a lightly floured surface and dust the rolling pin with flour. Roll from the center out to the edge. Rotate your dough a bit to the left or right and then repeat. If you keep rotating your dough after every roll then you will get a circle shape and you will minimize the chances that the dough sticks. Transfer the bottom crust of the pie to your pie pan and, from this point, bake according to the instructions in your pie recipe.
6. If your pie requires a top crust, then roll that crust out right before you need it.
If you can’t do cornstarch or potato starch can you just use 300 grams of tapioca with the same results?
Yes, that will be fine. Tapioca starch and corn starch are fairly equivalent.
Why do you use corn starch and not potato starch? Is it easier to work with? Is it because you have it on hand for your other recipes, so why bother purchasing another flour? Is it because it is a less starchy flour, therefore less bad for you?
My husband bought potato starch by mistake, so I have decided to make pie crusts (because it is so starchy) and to freeze them in early preparation for Thanksgiving. Yeah, I’m usually a procrastinator, so this is new for me, too.
I use corn starch mostly because it’s so easy to get. The recipe calls for tapioca starch and corn starch, right? I’d try one of the crusts that you make using potato starch now, just in case. Thanksgiving Day’s not the time to find out that your pie crust isn’t good. And it’s getting to be pie weather anyway =)