Crispy pie crust snacks

Here’s a recipe for creating pie crust snacks with scraps of leftover pie crust dough.

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t We love making homemade pie crust with our kids, just like our mothers did with us. And the best part of making pie crust is creating pie crust snacks with the small scraps of leftover dough.

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t Those small “scraps” of dough were our training ground. After our moms finished their last pie crust, they would gather all the scraps of dough, gently press them together and give them to us to practice our pie crust–rolling technique.

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t We love to break off the baked pie crust snacks and serve them with vanilla ice cream covered with Jamie’s mother’s homemade chocolate sauce.

Pie crust snacks

Directions:

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1. Move your oven rack to the second notch from the bottom. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F. Line a large cookie sheet with parchment paper.

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2. Take your leftover scraps of pie dough and gently press them together into a disk.

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3. With a lightly floured rolling pin, roll the dough out until it is thin enough that you can see the surface below through it (meaning it’s approximately 1/4 inch thick).

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4. Transfer the dough to a large, parchment-covered sheet pan.

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5. Spread butter over the top of the entire dough surface.

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6. Sprinkle white sugar generously over the buttered surface.

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7. Sprinkle ground cinnamon over the top of the sugar.

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8. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until the edges of the dough turn a light brown. Then remove it from the oven and do your best to let it cool for the next 10-15 minutes. (Quite honestly, that’s the hardest part of making pie crust snacks.)

Grandma Emma’s Pie Crust

Ingredients:

t 4 cups all-purpose flour
t2 teaspoons salt
t1 tablespoon sugar
t1 ¾ cups shortening (can be a mix or shortening and butter)
t1 tablespoon vinegar
t1 egg
t1/2 cup ice cold water

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Directions:

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1. In a medium bowl, combine flour, salt and sugar. Mix well.

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2. Using a pastry blender, cut shortening into the flour mixture until small pea-size clumps form.

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3. In a small bowl, combine vinegar, egg and water. Using a fork, mix until frothy.

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4. Add the liquid mixture to teh flour mixture and mix with a fork until the dough forms a slightly damp ball.

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5. Divide the ball into 5 equal parts and wrap each one in plastic wrap. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

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6. On a lightly floured surface, flatten one ball into a disk, Using a lightly floured rolling pin, roll from the center of the ball to the edges, giving dough a quarter turn after each roll. Flip the crust over every few turns to prevent it from sticking to teh work surface. Work carefully and handle dough gently, being careful not to stretch or tear the dough. When the round is about 10 inches in diameter, roll the crust around the rolling pin, transfer to a pie plate and roll it off the pin. Repeat with remaining ball of dough.

Makes five 9-inch crusts.