What is Blind Baking (and Why Should You Try It)?

You may have come across this word in recipe books several times but are still unsure what it signifies. Or maybe you’ve tried it once or twice and still haven’t gotten the ideal pie crust you’ve been looking for.

Don’t be thrown off by the unusual moniker if it seems like an exercise in extreme adventure baking. Blind baking is really rather easy to perfect if you understand why you’re doing it and the procedures involved.

For many amateur bakers, the difficulty is that recipes merely state that a crust should be blind baked without explaining what this entails or how to execute it. This is where this article comes in!

You’ll learn everything you ever wanted to know about blind baking, including what it is and how to do it.

So what is blind baking?

Blind baking is the technique of baking a pie crust or tart shell before adding the contents. It provides the crust an advantage over the filling and allows you to have greater control over how the crust bakes.

In this manner, the pastry might be entirely cooked or partly baked before adding the filling.

Why should I blind bake?

Several of us are unfamiliar with the disappointing mushy pie-crust foundation that may come from recipes with overly moist ingredients. Quiche and various fruit pies are especially susceptible to this issue.

Although you might blame it on the filling soaking into the crust (which isn’t totally incorrect), the fault is generally because the crust is under-baked.

We normally gauge the readiness of a pie by how the filling appears, or we remove it from the oven after it reaches a specified temperature. Yet we seldom check to see whether the foundation is sharp enough to achieve the desired uniformity.

This is logical, since after the filling has been cooked to our taste, we must remove the pie to prevent it from burning or over-cooking.

We have two connected difficulties here, both of which are handled via blind baking. We ensure that a pie crust is properly cooked and crisp before adding our wet ingredients by pre-baking it.

We may alter the length of time the crust spends in the oven by part-baking it, which is handy when the fillings demand a shorter baking time or a lower temperature than the crust.

Or maybe you don’t want to bake your filling at all. From chocolate pudding to fresh fruit tarts, a cold filling is often placed to a pre-baked crust.

Can I skip blind baking?

We are all strapped for time from time to time, and it may be tempting to skip the blind baking phase in such cases. Depending on the sort of pie you’re making, the consequences might vary from acceptable to catastrophic.

Although a somewhat moist foundation might be tolerated, delivering a pie with a crust that still feels like dough or doesn’t even hold together is unacceptable. To ensure outstanding results every time, it is worth the effort to learn and practice blind baking when called for in a recipe.

How do I blind bake?

Blind baking does not have to be difficult, and there are various options to explore. The recipe will most likely include the timeframes and temperatures necessary, as well as the degree to which the crust should be cooked.

The challenge is to keep the dough from rising or becoming deformed during baking. In the oven, moisture in the dough is turned to steam, and the release of this steam may cause the dough to puff up. This, in addition to appearing weird, might result in burned areas on the crust, impacting both the taste and texture.

Allowing the steam to escape or holding the dough in place will guarantee that your crust is even, golden, and crisp.

Different methods of blind baking

Docking is the most basic way of blind baking. It entails piercing the surface of the pastry dough with a fork all over to create numerous little holes before placing it in the oven. They enable steam to escape while preventing puffing.

Others swear by it, however it does not work for all varieties of pastry and is not infallible. It is not recommended for pies with wet contents, since they may leak through the gaps and into or beneath the crust itself.

A safer way is to use pie weights to weigh down the crust. A piece of baking paper or aluminum foil is laid over the pastry in your shape, followed by little weights to keep the dough in place. This has the added benefit of keeping the dough down as well as the edges up.

Reusable metal or ceramic pie weights may be bought for this purpose, or you can fill the crust with dry beans or grains. If you use them, be sure to take them out towards the end of the blind baking time to enable the crust to thoroughly brown.

A third, more beautiful approach of blind baking is to use a smaller pie shape as your weight. This should be placed on top of your parchment paper or foil to provide a hefty and flat weight to hold the dough in place.

This approach has the extra benefit of enabling you to flip the two forms and bake them upside down on a baking sheet. Although the form keeps the bottom of the pastry in place, gravity helps by drawing the edges of the crust down, preventing shrinking.

Why not invest in a set of layered pie forms to take use of this brilliant technique?

Check read our post on pie weight alternatives to learn more about more pie weight substitutions.

General advice

Whichever type of blind baking you employ, some basic guidelines will help you obtain even better outcomes.

To begin, chilling your crust before baking it offers numerous benefits. It not only decreases puffing, but it also keeps any crimps or fluting in place and lowers the probability of your baking paper sticking.

If you’re utilizing pie weights, you may need to change the number you use in relation to their weight. Steel or ceramic balls are likely to be heavier than dry beans, therefore numerous layers may be required to compensate.

Lastly, if the edges of the crust begin to burn during blind baking, cover them with foil or a silicone pie crust shield to preserve them.

Now there’s no reason not to blind bake that crust; you’re one step closer to the ideal pies you’ve always wanted to make!