Gluten-Free Pie Crust
A buttery shortcrust pastry made with gluten-free flour and an egg yolk, chilled for 30 minutes and blind baked for 20 minutes.
Photograph credit: Pie Crust by Kimberly Vardeman · CC BY 2.0 · Flickr
Before You Start
Chill the dough, or it will be sticky.
Roll it between two sheets of baking paper.
Patch cracks with warm fingers; they do not show once baked.
How to Make Gluten-Free Pie Crust
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Rub the butter into the flour, sugar and salt with your fingertips until it looks like fine crumbs.
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Mix the egg yolk with the cold water, add to the bowl and bring together into a dough.
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Wrap and chill for 30 minutes.
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Heat the oven to 190°C / 375°F. Roll the dough between two sheets of baking paper to 3 mm thick and lift into a 23 cm tin. Patch any cracks with your fingers.
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Prick the base, line with baking paper and baking beans and bake for 12 minutes. Remove the paper and beans and bake for 8 minutes more.
Related guides: Prep, cook and total time · Pan and tin size.
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Why the Method Works
It looks like an ordinary shortcrust and rolls out much like one, which is the surprise. The big difference is that gluten-free pastry has no elasticity, so it does not shrink in the oven, but it also cracks if it is rolled thin and dry.
Cold butter is rubbed into the flour until it looks like fine crumbs, and an egg yolk with a little water brings it together. The yolk is the binder. Chill the dough for 30 minutes so the butter firms up and the flour hydrates; warm dough is sticky and tears. Roll it between two sheets of baking paper, then lift the whole thing into the tin by flipping it.
If the pastry cracks, press it back together with warm fingers; it forgives patching better than wheat pastry. Prick the base, line with baking paper and baking beans, and bake until the edges are set. Remove the paper and bake again until the base looks dry and pale gold, which is 20 minutes in all.
Storage and Reheating
Keeps for 2 days wrapped. The raw dough freezes for 2 months.
Serving Gluten-Free Pie Crust
- Apple pie filling
- Quiche filling
- Lemon curd
- Custard
Common Questions About Gluten-Free Pie Crust
How long does Gluten-Free Pie Crust take to make?
20 minutes of preparation and 20 minutes of cooking, plus 30 minutes of chilling, so allow 1 hour 10 minutes from start to finish. The recipe serves 8.
What's in a Serving
Per serving, calculated from the ingredient list with USDA FoodData Central figures (SR Legacy). A calculation, not a laboratory analysis: brands, cuts and how you measure change the real numbers. How the figures are worked out.
Your notes on this recipe
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Compiled by Turab
Checked by script for timings, diet labels and nutrition arithmetic. How the recipes are checked. Found a mistake? Tell us.
First published ; last changed .
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