Flaky or Mealy
Under Pâte Brisée we usually separate our doughs in 2 categories, Flaky or Mealy dough. Flaky dough as the name suggest is prone to flaking, the dough after done just crumbles and melts in your mouth. Because of this flakiness one should be careful when handling the pie not to ruin the presentation. Flaky dough is very good for pre baking and storing for later usage with different fillings. Don't forget to make an additional amount of the dough for the pie top crust, we will post about this next, stay tuned.
Mealy dough is less flaky and used commonly for quiches. The main difference in technique is on how much you cut the cold fat being incorporated in to the flour. For the flaky result fat will get to pea size crumbs, similar to what we have already seen with Biscuits in a previous post. For mealy, we continue to cut up the fat, it resembles a grated Parmigiano cheese or coarse cornmeal.
Pies are usually round with a sloped side. When baking pie, it is recommended to dock your pie as can be seen in picture 2 above. The little holes allow steam to scape in the process of baking (there is naturally water in flour) and the surface will remain even avoiding forming bubbles and pockets. Check out some baked pies and steps in the picture gallery above, and yes, they do taste as good as they look.