If you have started baking recently, you will be having so many doubts about trivial things. But clearing those doubts is most important in getting the perfect results in baking. That is what I am trying to write in all my Baking Basics posts. Today we will see about lining a pie dish with the dough. When I started baking I found that lining the dish was so difficult though in the videos I saw they made it like it was the easiest job to do. Mostly the dough is rolled on counter top, lifted and fitted into a pie dish with ease. But when I made it myself, the dough tore and I never ever got it right. So here is a version which is easier and doesn’t need handling of dough. Even in this version you need to make sure that the dough is of correct consistency to get it right. Usually pie crust is refrigerated before use. If it is so hard after refrigeration, it will not be pliable and while you try to roll, it will crack. And if is not chilled it will be very soft and you will end up with a gooey buttery mass. So once you remove the cling wrapped dough from fridge, press it to see if it is pliable. You should be able to press it without cracking the dough and it should not be too soft. Refrigerate the dough for at least 30 minutes. If you feel that it is too hard, then keep it on counter for 5 minutes before checking it again. If too soft then place in fridge for more chilling. Once you feel that the dough is of correct consistency, you can line the dish.
This is the pie dish. It has two parts, one is the outer ring and the other the base plate.
Place the plate inside the ring and grease the dish with butter.
Place the dough between two sheets of cling wrap or plastic sheets. You can also use parchment papers instead.
Roll it into a disc bigger than the base of the pie dish added with two times the height by at least 3 inches ( this varies depending upon the depth of the dish. More the depth larger the circle.)
Remove the top sheet/ wrap.
Invert the disc carefully over the pie dish along with plastic wrap. Press the dough into the dish so that it lines all the corners of the dish.
Remove the wrap and cut the excess dough with a knife.
You can also trim it by pressing the sides into the dish. The excess dough will fall off leaving a neat edge.
At this stage you can blind bake the crust. Will talk about blind baking in another post.
Or fill it with the filling and bake.
If you are interested in learning the basics of baking here are some posts which could help you. Click on link for the posts – Baking Basics
Thanks Gayathri..I learnt a lot about lining a pie dish from your post. Hope you advice us in future also regarding baking.