This Blind Baked American Pie Crust is made with thick buttery rough puff style pastry in no time. It can be part or fully baked ready for sweet or savoury fillings to make a whole range of pies, tarts and flans. You’ll never buy a ready-made pastry case again!

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I am always obsessing over homemade pastry. Actually I’m obsessed with all pastry and pastry based dishes in general! My current obsession is working with American Pie Pastry which is a basically a quick and dirty version of traditional Puff Pastry.

Rough puff has been made by home bakers in the UK and US for decades. The difference is that in the US it is often rolled much thicker than we would tend to here in the UK. And they almost always use it for sweet pies and tarts, never for savoury applications.

The pastry recipe includes optional sugar so it can be used sweet or savoury fillings. And this large baked pie crust can be part baked or fully baked depending on how you’re going to use it.

This method of blind baking can also be used with other pastries. You can try any one of these:

Pâte Sucrée – a sweet traditional short pastry – see Tarte au Citron for the recipe.
Shortcrust – a short savoury pastry – see Quiche Lorraine for the recipe. Omit the thyme in the recipe for a plain version.
Puff Pastry – a rich and buttery properly laminated traditional puff pastry – see Puff Pastry for the recipe.

And if you’d prefer to make smaller individual tartlet cases, you can check out my Small Pastry Cases with Flaky Rough Puff post.

Why Blind Bake a Pastry Case?

The simple answer is to make sure that the pasty and filling are perfectly cooked at the same time.

More often than not, pastry will take longer to cook than a baked filling. So if you add the filling to an uncooked pastry case and bake, you’ll either end up with an overcooked filling or undercooked pastry.

The other reason is that sometimes we don’t want to cook the filling at all. Many classic sweet American pies like French Silk Pie are uncooked and simply set in the fridge. So for recipes like this we fully bake the pie crust.

Still Have Questions?

Simple! Just contact me and I will do my best to help as quickly as I am able. Head over to my Contact Me page, any of my social media channels or post a comment at the bottom of this page and I’ll see what I can do.

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The Recipe

Blind Baked American Pie Crust

5 from 1 vote

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Prep Time10

Cook Time22

Chilling Time15

Total Time47

Servings 9″/23cm crust

Author Chloe

Equipment

Ingredients

500 g American Pie Pastry – Rough Puff - fridge cold
1 Egg - white only
⅛ tsp Fine Salt
Vegetable Spray Oil - optional
Flour for dusting

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 220c fan | 240c | 430f.
Roll 500g American Pie Pastry out on a floured surface to around 7mm/ ¼ ” thick.
Use the pie dish to make sure that it is big enough to comfortably fit the tin and up the sides.
Move the dough into the tin. I find it easiest to fold the dough square into quarters then lift it into the tin. Line up the corner of the pasty quarter with the middle of the tin.
Carefully unfold the pastry.
Then gently ease the piece of dough into the tin.
Lift the sides on the dough into the centre rather than stretching the dough thinner to make it fit.
Use the side of your finger to make sure the dough is comfortably fitting right into the corner of the tin.
Use a knife to cut away the excess pastry. Neaten and/or crimp the edges slightly if you fancy.
Put the tin into the fridge to chill for at least 30 minutes. Or speed up the process and put it into the freezer for 15. Just don’t forget it's in there.
Once chilled, add a round cake liner or cut piece of parchment paper into the pastry case. Use your fingers to flatten out the ridges so it fits the pastry right to the edges.
Fill the paper case as full as it will go with baking beans. I like to bank them up against the edges.
Bake the pastry for 12 minutes.
Meanwhile separate the egg white from 1 Egg. Add a tiny pinch (⅛ tsp) Salt and mix in.
Remove the pastry from the oven and turn it down to 200°c fan | 220°c | 390°f. Very carefully remove the paper liner and baking beans.
You will find it safest to use a spoon to remove the beans into a heatproof container then take out the paper.
Use a brush to paint the base and sides of the pastry with a very thin layer of egg white. This will help to seal the pastry.
*Stop here if making a recipe with a baked filling*
Bake for a further 10 minutes until golden.
Allow to cool in the tin then carefully remove.
If the pastry has puffed up in the middle and you prefer more filling over a super flaky base, use the back of a spoon to push down any risen pastry when it comes out the oven.