Sunday, November 5, 2023

Let's Review: Is Parbaking Pie Crust Necessary? + How to Make Bread Ahead of Time

Friends, this past week I received an unsettling number of emails alerting me that Thanksgiving is less than three weeks away. This massive holiday always finds a way to sneak up on me, and as I sit in my hotel room this morning — I'm out in the Finger Lakes for a hockey tournament — I've accepted it is indeed time to start planning: menus, grocery lists, schedules.

One of the biggest sources of anxiety for many around the holidays is pie: with limited oven space, how does one make the many Thanksgiving pies close enough to the feast to ensure they taste fresh? And more important: how does one prevent the dreaded soggy bottom?

The answer lies in the parbake.

For years I dismissed the process as unnecessary, finding it to be a pain and ineffective. But two years ago, I found a photo in Erin McDowell's The Book on Pie depicting a correctly baked parbaked pie crust: the bottom of the crust was barely toasted, mostly blonde with the faintest hint of brown; the edges were lightly golden.

The photo made me realize I had been severely overbaking my parbaked pie crusts, which is likely why I never had much success with the process.

And so I gave Erin's method a go, which calls for baking the pies with weights (or dried beans) for 15-17 minutes at 425ºF and for just 2 to 3 minutes more without the weights, and it worked beautifully. In the photos below, do you see how nicely golden but not overly so the fully baked crust looks?

The beauty of parbaking is that it not only creates a superior textured crust in your finished pie but also allows you to get half of the pie-making process done ahead of time. Win-win.

I use a parbaked crust for these three favorite pies: Roasted Squash Pie (pictured above), Bourbon Pecan Pie, and Sister Pie's Salted Maple Pie.

You can find instructions in this post for both making pie crust and parbaking it, but I think the video will be most helpful here. It starts with my favorite foolproof food processor pie dough recipe, which employs a tea towel trick I learned from a French woman years ago, and ends with a parbaked shell.

A Few More Notes About Pie Crust

Do not bake pies directly on the rack — butter will seep out and when it hits the oven floor, it will make a smoky mess. Instead, place your pies on sheet pans and use parchment paper, if you wish, for easy cleanup.
If you have a Baking Steel or pizza stone, use it. Because steels and stones retain heat well, they encourage proper and even browning on the bottoms of the pie. They also help keep the oven temperature even as you open and close the door to check on your pie.
Thanksgiving Schedule: Make your dough on Monday and refrigerate it. Parbake your crusts on Tuesday or Wednesday. Let them cool completely, then tuck them into a jumbo ziplock bag. With that in mind, I find the jumbo-sized Ziplocks (2 or 2.5 gallon) to be so handy to have on hand around the holidays.

How to Parbake Pie Crust

How to Make Bread Ahead of Time

Last Monday I made a batch of these thyme dinner rolls, but instead of doing the quick 1.5- to 2-hour rise I used the method I use for focaccia, which is to refrigerate the dough immediately after mixing it.

On Wednesday, I pulled out the bowl about an hour before dinnertime, deflated and portioned it, then transferred the portions to a buttered muffin tin. Twenty minutes later, the rolls were in the oven, and 25 minutes later, the rolls were on the dinner table, the perfect accompaniment for our butternut squash soup.

Know that you can do this with nearly any bread dough: mix it, stash it in the fridge, then tend to it when you are ready (ideally within 3 days). Be sure the bowl is covered tightly to ensure the dough does not dry out.

I hadn't made these rolls in ages, and I'm so glad I did because I had forgotten how much I love them — in this most recent batch I used a mix of rosemary, sage, and thyme, and they turned out particularly well.

They're also much easier than the buttermilk pull-apart rolls I love making on holidays, and if you are someone who finds handling/shaping dough to be challenging, but likes the idea of a roll on the holiday table, this one is for you.

No-Knead Herby Dinner Rolls

Pizza Night

My pizza cookbook, Pizza Night, which will be published next April, is available for pre-order.

Pizza Night includes 52 pizza and 52 salad recipes, one combination for every week of the year, as well as five simple desserts. It's organized seasonally and includes recipes for the home oven, outdoor oven, the grill, Sicilian-style, Detroit-style, grandma-style, skillet pizzas, and more. There are both yeast and sourdough recipes for every style of pizza in the book and there is a gluten-free pizza crust recipe as well.

Pizza Night, in sum: