A Pastry Chef’s Secret for the Crispiest, Flakiest Pie Dough Ever

I first delved into the intricacies of pâte brisée, a French tart dough, during pastry school, when we used it as the base for a tarte aux pommes, a traditional French tart with paper-thin apple slices arranged in a circle, shingled over one another. It was buttery and flaky, and reminded me of my favorite American pie crust. Like pâte sucrée and pâte sablée, this fundamental French dough is a versatile base for pies, tarts, and other pastries. While pâte sucrée and pâte sablée are sweet and best paired with fruit or frangipane, brisée’s neutral flavor works equally well for desserts as it does for savory bakes like quiches, vegetable tarts, or canapés.

Buttery, flaky pâte brisée requires just a handful of basic ingredients: typically flour, butter, salt, water, and sometimes a touch of sugar. Some recipes also incorporate egg or egg yolk for a variation known as pâte à foncer, an egg-based dough that’s slightly sturdier and easier to work with but less tender. I prefer pâte brisée’s flaky texture, and instead of compromising texture for ease of workability, I’ve skipped the egg in the dough for the lightest, crispest pastry possible. But not to worry—my recipe below has tips for working with the crust, and it’s really not too finicky.

The Building Blocks of Pâte Brisée: Sablage and Fraisage

There’s no way around it: To make good pâte brisée, you need to get your hands dirty—or rather, buttery and floury. This recipe employs two key French pastry practices. First, there’s sablage, the motion of rubbing cold butter into flour with your fingertips, which coats the gluten proteins in fat, minimizing gluten development for a crisp, tender crust. While we want some gluten development for structure, we don’t want too much, which would result in a tough, brittle crust. Then, there’s fraisage, a technique that involves using the heel of your hand to smear the dough across a hard surface, distributing fat and moisture. The process creates long ribbons of butter, and as the shell bakes, these ribbons of butter melt, creating little pockets of steam that create the flaky layers in the crust. They’ll be especially obvious after freezing, so don’t be surprised by the marbled white appearance—it means you’re on your way to perfect pâte brisée.

Why It’s Important to Blind Bake—and How to Do It

Blind baking, or baking the pastry shell before you fill it, serves several purposes. First, it allows the crust to bake evenly and ensures that it can support a wet filling without leaking or becoming soggy. Blind baking also means that the crust can be used for fillings that will not be baked themselves, such as curds, mousses, or cream-based pie fillings. 

To blind bake, line the unbaked pastry shell with parchment (I like to crumple the paper so it conforms to the shape of the pan), then fill it with weights, such as pie weights, uncooked rice, sugar, or dry beans. Bake until the edges turn very light brown, remove the parchment carefully to avoid damaging the pastry, then follow the recipe you’ve chosen to fill and finish the pie or tart. You can partially blind bake pâte brisée, add a filling, then bake the rest of the way, or fully bake it for cold fillings like fruit curds and pastry creams.

Any flat or fluted tart pan will work for pâte brisée, but I recommend choosing one with a removable bottom. This handy feature makes it easier to remove the delicate pastry shell, minimizing the risk of breakage.

One more tip: If you plan to bake multiple tart shells in the same session, keep plenty of extra dried beans or your pie weight of choice on hand. Never use hot beans or weights for blind baking, as they will melt the butter in the crust before you’ve even had a chance to put the pastry in the oven.

5 Key Techniques to Keep in Mind for Making the Best, Flakiest Pâte Brisée

1. Relax and chill. You’ll notice there’s a lot of chilling in the recipe below. This is intentional: chilling relaxes the gluten—making the crust more tender—and keeps the butter firm, which is essential for a crispy, flaky crust. 
2. Pay attention to the balance of flour and water. Flour your rolling pin and work surface to prevent the dough from sticking, and also coat your fingertips with a thin layer of flour before pressing the dough into the pan. Don’t go overboard, though—too much flour will throw off the dry-to-liquid ingredient ratio, creating a dry, crumbly dough and a tough crust.
3.  Don’t overwork the dough. Excess kneading promotes gluten development, and too much gluten can toughen the pastry and cause it to shrink as it bakes.
4. Pay attention to the oven. Pâte brisée is not a “set it and forget it” recipe. Check the tart shell every few minutes (with the oven light on and door closed!), especially near the end of the bake. I also recommend using visual cues—not just the clock—as a guide. The pastry should be deeply golden-brown all over; the amount of time this takes will vary based on your oven, the pan you’ve chosen, and your blind baking technique.
5. Dock the pastry. After removing your chosen pie weights, prick small holes in the bottom to prevent the pastry from doming as it continues to bake. I recommend using a fork to dock tart shells, as the utensil can easily reach the edges of the pan.

How to Use Pâte Brisée

You can use pâte brisée anywhere you’d use a homemade pie crust, such as cherry or apple pie. In addition, this versatile dough works well for a range of traditional French pastry recipes such as tarte amandine (almond cream tart), tarte aux fruits (fruit tart with pastry cream), and tarte aux pommes (apple tart). In addition to sweet recipes, pâte brisée makes an excellent base for savory vegetable galettes, quiche, onion tarte tatin, and cheese and vegetable tarts. You can even use it to make canapés or press it into a muffin tin or mini tart tins to make appetizer-size portions of any quiche or tart.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk flour, sugar, and salt to combine. Add butter to flour mixture and toss with fingers until butter pieces are thoroughly coated with flour mixture. Using your fingertips, pinch and flatten butter, then rub it between your fingertips until a sandy texture forms, 3 to 4 minutes. (It should resemble coarse breadcrumbs with some pea-size pieces still visible but no large chunks of butter remaining.)

Drizzle water over flour mixture and use a bench or dough scraper to incorporate until large clumps form. Tip mixture out onto un-floured countertop and, using the heel of your hand, smear the mixture into the countertop away from you, then use a dough scraper to gather the dough back together. Repeat 2 to 3 times, until a shaggy dough forms, then use your hands to gently squeeze the dough together. Do not overwork; dough should hold together but still feel slightly crumbly, not wet or sticky.

Flatten into a 6-inch disc. Wrap tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm, at least 1 hour, or up to 24 hours.

Using as much flour as needed, roll dough to 1/8-inch thickness and 10 inches wide, adding more flour to the rolling pin or surface as needed to prevent the dough from sticking. You should see streaks of butter in the rolled dough.

Gently transfer dough to 9-inch tart pan. Using lightly floured fingertips, press dough into the bottom edge and fluted sides of the pan; using a pastry brush, dust off any excess flour. Refrigerate until dough is firm to the touch, about 30 minutes.

Using a sharp paring knife, trim away excess dough from the edges so that the dough is level with the top of the pan. Refrigerate tart shell for at least 1 hour or up to 24 hours.

Using a fork, prick tart dough all over. Freeze tart shell for 30 minutes.

To Bake: Adjust oven rack to middle position and preheat oven to 400°F (205° C). Place a crumpled sheet of baking parchment inside the frozen shell and fill to the brim with dried beans, sugar, raw rice, or baking weights.

Bake crust until edges are firm and lightly golden brown, 23 to 27 minutes. (The bottom will still look “doughy” and light in color.) Remove tart crust from oven and carefully remove parchment and weights. Return crust to oven and bake until golden brown around the edges, 7 to 10 minutes. At this point, the crust can be used with fillings that require further baking. For a crust that will be used with uncooked fillings such as a mousse, continue baking until bottom and sides are deeply golden brown, about 5 to 7 minutes more. Transfer to a wire rack and allow tart to cool completely, 45 minutes to 1 hour, before filling or removing from tart pan.

Special Equipment

Dough scraper, rolling pin, 9-inch tart pan with removable bottom, baking weights or beans

Notes

This recipe can be doubled.

For sweet tarts: Increase sugar to 2 teaspoons (10g). For additional flavor, you can also add 1 teaspoon vanilla paste. Whisk vanilla paste into ice water to incorporate it evenly into the dough.

For tartlet shells: Blind bake at 400° F (205° C) for 20 to 25 minutes, or until lightly golden brown around the edges. Remove parchment and weights and dock with a fork. At this point, the crust can be used with fillings that require further baking. For a crust that will be used with uncooked fillings such as a mousse, continue baking until deeply golden brown, about 8 to 10 minutes more.

Make-Ahead and Storage

Dough can be tightly wrapped in plastic wrap and refrigerated for up to 24 hours. Allow to sit at room temperature for 15 minutes, or until soft enough to roll. Dough can be also wrapped first in a layer of plastic wrap and then a layer of aluminum foil and frozen for up to 1 month. Thaw in refrigerator, about 4 hours.

Lined and trimmed tart pan can be tightly wrapped in plastic wrap and refrigerated for up to 24 hours or tightly wrapped first in a layer of plastic wrap and then a layer of aluminum foil and frozen for up to 1 month. Bake from frozen.

Wrapped tightly in plastic wrap, baked tart shell will keep at room temperature for up to 1 day.

To freeze baked tart shell, wrap tightly in plastic wrap and aluminum foil and freeze for up to 1 month. Thaw at room temperature, about 1 hour.