Normally when I am making a pie I go straight for my standard all butter crust but I recently came across the idea of a biscuit like pie crust that was just begging to be tried. This pie crust starts out a lot like a biscuit recipe where butter is cut into a mixture of flour and baking powder to form a coarse meal like texture and then milk is mixed in to form a dough. From there, instead of forming a disc and cutting out biscuits the dough is rolled out into a thin pie crust. As you might guess after seeing the baking powder in the ingredients, this crust will rise a bit as it bakes and it forms a really nice light and fluffy and yet crispy crust. One of the things that is good about this pie crust is that it uses significantly less butter than a butter crust which makes a great alternative for when you are trying to eat lighter.
Biscuit Pie Crust
A light and flaky biscuit like pie crust that is a great alternative to the pastry pie crust that uses a lot less butter. To change things up you can add some herbs to the crust. This biscuit crust works equally well in sweet pies like a peach pie or savoury pies like a chicken pot pie or a corn and tomato pie.
ingredients
- 2 cups flour
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 3/4 teaspoons salt
- 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cold and cut into 1/4 inch cubes
- 3/4 cup milk
- 2 tablespoons basil, chopped (optional)
directions
- Mix the flour, baking powder and salt in a food processor.
- Add the butter and pulse until it resembles coarse meal.
- Add the milk and pulse until it forms a dough.
- Split the dough in half and roll each out on a well floured surface one at a time.
Corn and Tomato Pie
All Butter Pie Crust (Pâte Brisée)
Gloria says
Kevin love this pie crust! gloria
Anonymous says
any temperature or timing recommendations for baking?
jillian :: cornflake dreams. says
YES please.. perfect for my chicken pot pies. xoxo jillian:: cornflake dreams
aBroad says
I will try but I won't promise to succeed.
I don't know what it is about me and pie crusts but we don't get along well. They just don't co-operate.
Angela says
What a great idea, yum!
http://mytastyliving.blogspot.com/
elly says
This looks great, and I appreciate that it uses less butter. Definitely going to give this one a try for a chicken pot pie in the future!
Ritsin says
I'm not a baker but this looks too good to pass up. I'll give it a try. Is it suitable for sweet pies or strictly savory?
Kevin says
Ritsin: This crust works well on both sweet and savoury pies. Just think about a peach cobbler topped with a biscuits only this time the biscuit dough is rolled out into a pie crust instead of being formed into discs that are baked on top.
Jenni says
What did you fill your pie with?? I know it could work with any filling… pot pie is big in this house (and I WILL be trying this crust on it the next time) but I'm just curious 😀 It looks yummy! (My stand-by pie crust is also all-butter, but I LOVE biscuits… so I'm already swayed!)
Jenni says
Ugh… ignore that last comment… I see now after properly going to your blog, that it's tomato and corn. Premature commenting strikes again. 🙂
Anonymous says
2 Questions
You call for the salt divided but unsure if it all gets used at once.
Would you blind bake this if using for a fruit pie?
Great idea! Look forward to using!
Kevin says
Anonymous: I cleaned the Recipe up. You can pre-bake it but keep in mind that it will rise a bit due to the baking powder.
Laurie Jackson says
OK Kevin I’m going to try this right now. But my butter either frozen or room temp so I’m going to grate the frozen butter into the food processor. Going to halve the recipe and press it into a quiche baking dish for a Holiday breakfast quiche with all these pullet eggs, (they laid nine yesterday!) bacon, sausage, heavy cream, sauteed onions and sweet peppers, with aged white cheddar cheese. My hubs is leaving work early and will be home for breakfast. I never trust recipes I’ve not tested, but then I saw it was Closet Cooking so it is tested!!! Yay! Everything I make from your recipes is a hit. Happy Labor Day! First Google result was your recipe BTW. Google knows me and Closet Cooking! 😀
kevin says
Frozen butter is perfect! That breakfast quiche sounds great! 🙂
Marna says
I would like to use this recipe for savory turnovers. What do you recommend to use to seal the edges?
kevin says
You can use one egg lightly beaten/mixed with 1 tablespoon water.
Jim says
I wanted to make a Taco Pie and guess what… no pie crusts. Found this and it looked simple enough so I tried it. WOW! No more bought pie crusts for my future Taco Pies. This came out wonderful! The perfect crust for my pie. Tasty ingredients and tasty crust. The crust rose just enough to make this a wonderful meal. The bought crust just browned and were pretty much tasteless but this crust gave my Taco Pie a good tasty foundation! Thanks so much for sharing. It’s definitely a “Keeper”. – Jim.
P.S. My better half thinks I’m a genius, LOL!
kevin says
That taco pie sounds amazing with this biscuit crust!
Bonnie Camille Kozowski says
Can I use pillsbury biscuit mix to make a pie crust for a chocolate chess pie?
Jimmy says
I want to make a pumpkin pie with this. Should I pre bake the crust? If so what temperature and for how long? Thank you.
kevin says
You do not need to prebake, it will bake with the pie. Enjoy!
Anthony sowerby says
Hi am in UK and use gluten free of which I use schar all purpose flour ( most others are difficult to course at present) will this all purpose be ok for biscuit pastry crust please and do I just cook on 180 % as with most pastry thanks tony
kevin says
I have not used that brand of gluten-free flour before; if it recommends using it in the same way as all-purpose purpose flour, then it should work! Enjoy!
Anthony sowerby says
Measurements are important ( especially as I cook gluten free) so cups and dessert spoons especially spoons for butter are not accurate so what’s your equivalent gram , ounce or cup to say six dessert spoons of butter
Carol says
I just want to know if I can just use it right from the can ??? I figured roll out like a pie crust and just put in pie pan or as cobbler ?>\\\