Needed: ice cold hands

Lard and ice water. And not using whole wheat pastry flour ever again.

Hmm, I've never tried lard. Used to use Crisco and pulse in the food processor till I read about the butter and finger method. And I know butter isn't the best possible shortening for this but the smell of butter and flour ALONE is worth the price of admission.

So I ice the pie pans and yeah, add ice water.

Lard does amazing things to the texture of baked goods - try a mix of half butter and half lard. If you can get leaf lard from the butcher it's better than the processed Armour lard in a tub. But even the tub lard is pretty amazing in pie crust.

Of course butter is the best shortening. Butter plus vegetable shortening (if you don't want to go the lard route) is good.

Two tips from R0se L3vy B3r3nbaum: Cut in the shortening in two batches (which I think retains more of it in flaky form) and add a smidge of cider vinegar as part of your liquid.

Half lard, half butter. Hold your hands under the tap for a few minutes to make them nice and cold (mine are naturally warm to compensate for my icy heart).

Madchen's Ice Cold Fingers Of Doom.

Put the bowl in the fridge first too, that helps. But the 50/50 butter lard mix works for me.

my mom's (and thus my) pie crust is not traditional at all but I'm so fond of it! White flour flaky crust just doesn't appeal to me at all, it seems so pasty and bland. We make ours with whole wheat flour and oil, it's very dense but has a nice tooth-feel and texture.

I have freezing hands all the time. I should hire myself out to pastry chefs.

Chris, what does the cider vinegar do?

New question: does anyone do their cutting in with actual knives? I've never seen it in real life and couldn't work out the rhythm. Have finally settled on the method Steingarten describes (learned from Marion Cunningham) of sweeping thumb across fingers & letting the bits of dough sift through. My mother swears by pulsing w/ food processor but then to be fair she's usually making at least 4 pies at once.

The cider vinegar is just for flavor, I believe. Adds a little "kick", but it's pretty subtle.

After time using a pastry blender and then a standing mixer, I now use the food processor. It's pretty excellent -- bing bang boom -- but do make sure you freeze the flour and the shortening (or the first batch, at least, if you're using the "two parts" method) for at least half an hour beforehand.

I've used the knives method (you sweep the blades toward and across each other, like scissors), but I prefer my wire pastry blender.

Teeny, can you share your whole wheat flour crust recipe? I bought a bunch of whole wheat pastry flour, specifically because I thought it would make yummy pie crust. But it just doesn't work for my usual flaky recipe. Actually, it was completely disasterous. But I still have hope!

One-third whole wheat to two thirds other should work...

By "a bunch" I should qualify: I bought 10 lbs of whole wheat pastry flour and a 25 lb bag labeled "unbleached white flour", which was in fact filled with whole wheat flour. So, I'm interested in using up as much whole wheat flour as humanly possible.

I should dig up that recipe for 100% wheat flour rolls/bread (with cumin, they are the yum).

whole wheat flour with a bit of oat bran is great for tasty breakfast muffins, with raisins or I guess any other fruit.

to the best of my recollection:

1 cup white flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 t. salt
Mix those dry ingredients together.
Then combine 1/3 cup oil and 1/4 cup ice water (I use a fork to kind of whisk it) and add it to the dry ingredients.

This is regular flour, not pastry flour too! I think this would make two 9" crusts. It looks like it would come out hard as a rock but it's fine. I use it on pumpkin and apple pies most often.

Thanks Teeny, I'll give it a go.