My pastry chef called me out for being too heavy handed with the dough

She told me I was overworking the pie crust because I was using my palms instead of my fingertips. I always thought you had to be firm to keep things together, but she showed me how the heat from my hands was melting the butter before it even hit the oven. Started using a bench scraper to cut in the butter and just barely touching it after that. First batch after her advice came out flaky and tender instead of tough, which surprised me since I had been doing it wrong for like two years. Has anyone else had a mentor call them out on a basic technique they thought they had down?

3 comments

3 Comments

jordan9032d ago

Man I actually just saw a video about this exact thing the other day. The guy was saying how your hands are basically like hot plates for butter based doughs.

daniel4742d ago

How did the texture compare to your old crust side by side? Were you able to taste the difference right away or did it take a few tries to really notice it?

oscar7431d ago

Honestly that's a brutal wake up call but so worth it. The texture difference is night and day once you actually feel the dough after using the bench scraper method. Took me one try to notice the flakiness but the tenderness really hit me on the second batch when I finally stopped overworking it.