Cooking Desserts

How to keep Pie Crusts from Turning Soggy

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"How to keep Pie Crusts from Turning Soggy"
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However you fill or make your pie, the one thing that you must prevent from happening is a soggy pie crust. Not only will this be unappetizing to discriminating taste buds, but a soggy pie crust will not hold the filling very well, either. Here are some tips for keeping your pie crusts from becoming soggy.

The most important tip to remember when baking a pie is to bake the crust beforehand. This is invariably the key step to preventing soggy pie crusts. Preheat your oven to the specified temperature, then bake the pie crust until it is slightly golden brown, which generally takes about 10 minutes or so. Do not over bake the pie crust because it will continue to bake after the filling is added. If you do not want your pie crust to be too brown, you must not overdo this step. Use pie crust weights to keep the crust from bubbling up. 

Another key step to preventing soggy crusts is to make sure that your filling is not too wet. There is a big difference between 'wet' and 'gelatinous,' in which case the latter typically describes most pie fillings. For example, if the 'sauce' is too thin, it will most likely make the crust very wet. In this case, you will need to decrease the amount of 'sauce' if you want to leave it thin. If, however, you want to make a thicker, more gelatinous 'sauce,' you can do so without harming the quality of the pie crust. The lesson to remember is that the pie crust is like a towel: it will soak up a lot of the juices from the filling if the juices are too thin.

Some pie crusts can be more susceptible to turning soggy than others. For example, a graham cracker crust that is pre-baked is going to be less susceptible to sogginess compared to a flour-based crust that has also been pre-baked. One way to lessen the susceptibility of a pie crust to sogginess is to make sure that the pie crust itself comes straight from the fridge before handling. It will hold up better in the oven, especially after it has been pre-baked.

Wet, soggy pie crusts are generally unappealing. However, you can prevent your pie crusts from meeting this sad demise if you follow some or all of these tips. You will be able to create a delicious pie that holds its shape during serving. 

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