Signwatcher... some pies do call for prebaking the crust. This is generally called "blind" baking, and you usually either put some dry beans or chains of ball bearings (pricey, but wonderful if you do a lot of this type baking) to keep the empty crust from buckling as it bakes.
In general, these prebaked crusts are used for cream based pies (like a banana cream, for example) and for some custards.
I use a pie crust recipe which I think may have been originally from Martha Stewart, although I never did watch her on TeeVee. It calls for 1/3 cup lard, 1/3 cup butter, 1/4 tsp salt and 2 cups flour. After cutting the fat into the flour and salt mixture, you blend in between 1/3 to 1/2 cup ice water, until the crust dough just holds together. I've adapted it to using just 2/3 cup of butter, unless we've raised hogs and I happen to have lard on hand. The pure butter crust is wonderful!
I probably should mention that I never make just a single crust recipe (the above makes a double crust pie). I triple it, using my KitchenAid mixer, and if I don't need more than one pie at that time, I pat out measured (dividing the dough into 3rds, and then SLIGHTLY "off" halves... the bottom requires a bit more dough than the top crust) balls of dough, then pat them into flattened disks about 1" thick. While doing this, make sure the edges are smooth and aren't cracked. Freeze them in heavy ziploc bags. You can then remove one or two dough "disks" from the freezer, thaw at room temp (or overnight in the fridge) and you'll have "ready to bake and serve" pie crusts.
If you really want to learn more, go to the King Arthur Flour website and start reading!!
http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/
If you click on their "learn" section, they have a "complete pie baking guide" among other useful things.
They also sell several really wonderful cookbooks, which, while pricey, are actually textbooks- they explain the hows and whys as well as what to do.
The "trick" to getting flaky, light pie crusts is to handle the dough as little as possible. Use ICY water for mixing the dough, and don't mash the butter into the flour- you want it "cut in" to the flour, so it looks like fine peas or very coarse cornmeal. I personally prefer using a pastry cloth (much easier cleanup, for one thing) and I made my own years back from unbleached 100% cotton duck fabric. Rolling the dough out definitely is a bit of an art... you really want to roll from the center outwards, and turn the dough round 90° after every few strokes with the rolling pin. I'm betting there are some good videos out there, either on YouTube or the King Arthur website.
Summerthyme
