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As you can see, this is a great tool to have in the kitchen whether you’re a beginner home cook or a pro. It can replace some of the work done by food processors or electric mixers, which is helpful if the power ever goes out or if more than one person is cooking at the same time.
An egg wash—a simple mix of milk (or water) and egg—creates that golden sheen we see on bakery pies, and it even gives the crust a little extra-crisp texture. Without the egg wash, the pie crust will brown but will look extremely dull. For a little sparkle, I always sprinkle pies with coarse sugar prior to baking. Gives the top a lovely sweet crunch and looks pretty, too.
Always take your time when working with pie dough. It’s not a race! Treat the dough with a little TLC. You are not angry at the pie dough (but maybe you are LOL). Don’t roll it out too forcefully or rush through a decorative topping. Set aside enough time to really concentrate on it. Put on some music or invite some friends or family to join you, and enjoy the process. I promise it’s worth it! If you have any experience molding fondant decorations into silicone molds, you've already got a good idea of how easy it is to produce impressive 3-dimensional shapes this way. Williams Sonoma has created a silicone mold specifically for molding pie crust strips, outfitted with five designs that would otherwise be difficult and time-consuming to create by hand.
We liked that the cutter was especially easy to use, on par with a cookie cutter. The crust cutter is constructed in the shape of a flower, but the fluted outer edge is just a decorative way to hold the petal shapes of the cutter together and doesn't actually cut through the dough. The cutouts can be used to decorate the top of the crust in addition to the decorative vents the cutter makes. This sunflower cutter is easy enough to use for little hands, making your next pie-making session a little more fun for everyone.
With all of this pie-making practice (including recipe fails!), I’ve learned which kitchen tools are most helpful for making homemade pies. And I’m so happy to share it all with you. Karen Resta, the original author of this roundup, is a writer specializing in food culture and history, cooking, pastries, and restaurants. She's also a former pastry chef and has traveled to Budapest, Kyiv, and Paris during their fashion weeks as a photographer and writer, always finding the best authentic pastries along the way. She now spends a lot of her free time baking at home and recommends quality within your given budget. Having the right tools available and knowing how to use them well (it can take practice, like anything else) makes all the difference, and she curated this list with that in mind. Finally, the look of your pie making machine may also be a consideration. Some have a traditional vintage design, while others are more contemporary. Wattage
Why not add a fun design to the top of your pie to make your dinner guests smile before you slice into your masterpiece? Or perhaps a cute animal shape or a fun picture? And why not try some letters and add one of your guests’ names or even a “Happy Birthday” message to the top of your pie to really make it stand out! Planning a themed party? For many years, I used only salt and nutmeg to season the dough, so one day, I decided to add a little quantity of sugar to see if there would be any difference. Lo and behold, it tasted much better! Egg This may be a small tool, but it’s been made to last a lifetime. Wash and dry it by hand to preserve the olivewood handle. We did notice that the wood seemed a little dry straight out of the box and a little mineral oil rubbed into the handle might help extend its life. Each of the pie crust cutters we selected was sent to our baking expert's home kitchen for extensive testing in a realistic setting at the height of pie-making season in November 2021. We made and baked more than 30 pies with these pie crust cutters, testing how easy or difficult it was to use each cutter and how well they stood up to peak-pie season use. Slicing, punching, and rolling chilled pie dough with each cutter side-by-side gave us a clearer understanding of the different ways each of these tools can be used. Our expert has continued to use many of these cutters since initial testing to give us a more in-depth view of their quality over time. This useful kitchen tool is known by three different names. The official name is “pastry blender," for the job it was originally designed to perform. Other names you may hear it referred to are “dough blender” and “pastry cutter" (although these are technically inaccurate). What can a pastry blender do? It can cut butter into pastry dough, mix biscuits (like Copycat Red Lobster Cheddar Bay Biscuits) or cookie dough, smash up ground beef into pieces in a hot pan, mash cooked potatoes, and even help make good guacamole. It can mix a streusel topping, chop whole canned plum tomatoes into smaller pieces for a spaghetti sauce, dice boiled eggs for an egg salad, and blend the ingredients for hummus.Once cut, the lattice will expand to cover the width of the pie, but the length will stay the same. Plan accordingly, by making sure your dough is as long as you need it to be to cover the surface of your pie, although it only needs to be about half as wide. We found the lattice easy to stretch over the pie with attractive results, but don't worry if it takes one or two attempts to master. If you’re looking for a pie crust cutter that will make your pies stand out, but still cover the majority of your pie, this might be the one. The sunflower design is a unique and beautiful upgrade to a simple vented pie crust. Old-fashioned looking itself, it’s made of silver tin-plate steel, and it wouldn’t look out of place displayed on a kitchen wall. Egg is a binding agent. It binds ingredients together and gives them stability. Using egg not only binds the dough ingredients together, it also makes the meat pie to be crispy. Water and Milk The Williams Sonoma Lattice Pie Crust Cutter is a straightforward cutter that makes creating a trellis-style lattice pattern for a top pie crust incredibly simple. First, you roll your pie dough out to the desired diameter, then gently lay the dough on top of the cutter. Using a flat rolling pin, press the pie dough onto the cutter to slice the diamond pattern into the dough. To move the dough to your pie, you'll lift the tray away from the lattice cutter base and slide or flip your dough directly onto the pie. In a fraction of the time that it would take to slice and weave strips of pie dough into a lattice pattern, you've got a clean and consistent lattice top pie.
We used this fluted pastry wheel to cut strips of dough for a lattice-top pie, and were impressed with the durability of the cutter overall and the stability of the wheel itself. There wasn't any excessive wobbling of the wheel while cutting, and it rolled cleanly through chilled pie dough without needing to push too hard into the dough. It's also easy to control to keep it cutting straight, which is ideal for people who prefer to free-cut their dough instead of using a straight edge as a guide. It is a little heavier than other cutters, so it may not be ideal for those with limited hand strength. But the curved wooden handle is easy to hold onto and the weight is what helps push the cutter through the dough. It can be washed in the dishwasher if it's especially messy after use, but should be washed by hand and scrubbed with a brush and warm, soapy water to extend the life of the wood handle. Crust cutters were chosen to include a variety of tools, including traditional pastry wheel cutters for lattices, as well as punches, molds, and cutters for newer crust designs. The cutters we tested range from fun kitchen gadgets for beginners, to cutters for serious home bakers, and tools fit for a professional kitchen. The wheels and accordion construction are very sturdy and tighten into place without any wobbling, but since there are more moving parts, it's also more likely to be damaged if not treated with care. With long-term use, we noticed that the wingnut used to tighten and hold the accordion at the desired width may not get quite as tight over time. To keep it strong, completely loosen the wingnut when resizing and avoid collapsing or stretching the accordion while the wingnut is tightened, even a small amount. We also noticed that taking care to protect the wheels over time will help this tool stay precise. While this cutter is made of stainless steel and can be run through the dishwasher after an especially messy project, it’s best to wash it with a dish brush by hand in hot, soapy water.From fruit pies like apple pie, cherry pie, peach pie, and blueberry pie; to rich and smooth cream pies like French silk pie, pumpkin pie, banana cream pie, and cheesecake pie… A pie maker with a crimped edge is also a great option. This gives your pies a traditional look, and it helps you get that wonderful crispy crust! Other good features to look out for are non-slip feet and a cool touch handle. Given how unfussy this cutter is, we found that you could cut dozens of lattice crusts without having to do much more than pop out any leftover diamond pieces from the cutter holes. When you've finished a rinse in warm soapy water is enough to clean this cutter off, but it's not made for dishwasher use. If you don't have a pie crust cutter that crimps the edges for you, grab a fork and press the fork prongs down onto the rim of the pie dish. Do this all the way around the rim. You can also use your fingers to seal and make a design on the edge of the pie crust.
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