You can always just go buy a crust, I usually do. Marie Callender’s™ Deep Dish Pie Shells are a winner as far as I’m concerned. Or you can go ahead and make a good crust. I’ve included a homemade crust recipe here that I’ve actually used exactly four times in four years. It’s good, but buying one is just as good and a whole lot easier. And if you’re a lazy man like me, you’ll almost always use a store-bought pie crust, unless you’re just trying to show off. If you precook, you should put these in a big Ziploc bag and refrigerate till you put in the filling.
Ingredients
- 2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
- 3/4 cup Crisco shortening
- 1/2 stick butter
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 5 tablespoons cold water
Preparation
Mix flour and salt. Then mix Crisco into flour using a pastry blender or by hand, using small chunks of Crisco until this forms small chunks. Use about 2 tablespoons of water, mixed into dough to cause chunks to combine a little. Chop butter into small chunks and fold into mixture until it forms small chunks again. Mix in rest of water a little at a time until you’ve got a ball of dough. Wrap with plastic and put in refrigerator for an hour. Remove from plastic and cut in half. Form each half into a flat pancake by hand. Working on a flour dusted surface, roll out each to be about 1/4-inch thick and about 10-11 inches diameter. Place each into pie pans and trim edges so they don’t go too far over the edge of the pan. Prebake at 400 for 12-15 minutes.