Sourdough Pie Crust
Sourdough Pie Crust, where have you been all my life? This pie crust is tender, flaky and tastes amazing. This just might become your go-to pie crust recipe. This recipe uses an entire cup of sourdough discard.
If you’re a sourdough-bread baker, you know how painful it is to throw away a whole cup of hard-earned yeasty goodness every time you need to replenish your starter. This recipe is a great way to use that discard to make an incredible pie crust.
If you don’t already have one, I can show you how to make a sourdough starter and how to feed a sourdough starter.
Why Sourdough Pie Crust is so good:
- Sourdough discard does amazing things for the flavor and texture of a basic flaky pie dough.
- Sourdough starter is acidic. Acidic ingredients tenderize gluten. Sourdough discard helps keep this pie crust tender.
- As the crust bakes there is a tiny bit of lift from the natural yeast in the sourdough starter. I find that lift helps make the crust even flakier as the air pockets in the dough poof up a bit and separate the layers of dough.
- Sourdough Pie Crust smells amazing as it’s baking in the oven. The yeasty, bready smell is totally tempting.
Ingredients
Ingredient Notes
- Flour – This recipe uses a mixture of all purpose and cake flour. All purpose flour will give the dough enough structure so it can hold the flaky texture and a small proportion of cake flour will help keep it tender. In a pinch, you can use bleached AP flour and get good results.
- Fat – I like to use a mixture of half vegetable shortening and half butter. The vegetable shortening has a higher melting point and keeps the crust from slumping as it bakes. The butter is, well, delicious! You can use all vegetable shortening for a vegan pie crust or all butter if that’s your preference. I sometimes use leaf lard in my pie crust. If you have that available you can use it in place of the shortening.
- Sourdough Discard – This recipe was developed using a 100% hydration starter. That means the starter is fed with equal weights of starter, flour and water. You may need to adjust the amount of starter in the recipe based on the moisture level of your starter.
How to make Sourdough Pie Crust
See the recipe card for detailed measurements and instructions.
- Mix the fat in two stages.
- First mix in the shortening, then toss in the slices of cold butter.
- Add the sourdough discard to the flour/butter mixture.
- There is no other water in the crust other than the water in the starter.
- Mix with a spatula until the dough starts to come together.
- Use your hands to gather the dough together until the all the loose flour is mixed in.
- Gather the dough into a “shaggy” mass.
- Do not knead, just gently gather the dough together.
- Wrap the dough and refrigerate for several hours or over night before rolling.
- This will give the flour time to absorb the water in the dough.
- The bits of butter and a little lift from the starter will help form the flakes.
I used Sourdough Pie Crust to make a sensational Vanilla Pear Pie and the best Chicken Pot Pie ever.
I know you hate to throw away that sourdough discard. Check out these recipes that use sourdough discard.
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Sourdough Pie Crust
Ingredients
- 7 ½ oz all purpose flour (1 ½ cups (see note))
- 3 ½ oz cake flour (⅔ cup)
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
- 3 oz vegetable shortening (or leaf lard, cold)
- 4 oz unsalted butter (very cold and sliced into ¼" thin slices)
- 8 oz sourdough discard (1 cup (100% hydration))
Instructions
- Combine 7 ½ oz all purpose flour, 3 ½ oz cake flour, 1 teaspoon salt and 1 tablespoon granulated sugar. Whisk together to mix the ingredients evenly.
- Using your fingers, cut 4 oz lard or shortening into the flour mixture until it resembles coarse corn meal. Using your fingers, toss 4 oz unsalted butter into the flour mixture. Allow the slices of butter to break up into slightly smaller pieces into the flour. Work quickly so the butter doesn't get warm. Don't break the butter down completely. There should be some large flakes remaining.
- Pour 8 oz sourdough discard onto the flour all at once and toss to combine. Gently press the dough just until it comes together. It will look a little dry in spots. The moisture will redistribute in the dough as it rests.
- Wrap the dough and refrigerate for at least 2-3 hours before using.
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Any suggestions for doing this with a wheat-free discard? My daughter loves pies and I’ve made her a wheat-free starter but it’s a lot thicker than the normal one even though I do the same ratio of ingredients. I made this recipe over the summer with the regular discard and it was so good, I wanted to use it for pumpkin pie this week, but I feel bad not letting her eat the crust (it’s my favorite part!)
Thanks!
Hi Kim, sorry I don’t have experience with wheat free recipes. Maybe someone else can make a suggestion? Would the entire recipe have to be wheat free?
@Eileen Gray, yeah, it does. It’s not gluten that’s the problem (common mix-up, you can actually have one without the other!)
About to give it a try! We’ll see how it goes. She usually eats most things without complaining, so that’s good.
It was extra crumbly so I added more water (not sure how much, a few splashes until it seemed good). I did have to mix it more though because I didn’t realize how crumbly until after I took it out of the fridge. And I had run out of shortening which is hard to get here (in the UK) so used more butter. Daughter had a taste as I was transferring her mini pies to another container and she said it was good, so it probably turned out fine. In future, I will just add some more water at the start.
Thanks again!
Hello! I’m a huge sourdough starter fan and am so happy I found your website! One of my cookbooks is a book all about bacon and one of the recipes in the cookbook calls to use clarified bacon fat to make a pie crust. I’d love to make a pie crust using both sourdough starter and bacon grease! In your opinion, do you believe replacing the vegetable shortening for clarified bacon fat (cold) could work?
Yes. I almost always use leaf lard instead of vegetable shortening when I make pie dough.
I’m ‘babysitting’ the sourdough starter from work and need some discard recipes to try.
This looks simple and delicious.
Is it possible to make without the shortening, just substitute more butter?
Thanks!
Yes!
Looks good and I’m about to try your recipe. But why perpetuate the myth that you need to discard starter? Sure there’s a period in the beginning when it makes sense not to feed the whole developing starter, but after that, there’s no reason to throw any starter away. Just keep the amounts small and then there’s no waste. Make more if you want unfed starter.
There are a million ways to make and keep starter. For those who prefer not have less discard I recommend keeping a small starter.
Update: this was easily the absolute best pie crust I have ever made both taste-wise and because of flakiness. Thanks for the recipe!
This recipe sounds great! I’m making a Savoury pie do i newsroom add the sugar or could I reduce the amount of sugar?
The sugar doesn’t make the crust sweet, just helps with tenderizing and browning. I always use the sugar even for savory pies.