Is a food processor's dough blade the same as using a pastry blender by hand?
Friday, January 27th, 2012 at
12:01 am
As in a KitchenAid food processor, an attachment that comes with it is a dough blade. Can that be used in place of a pastry blender when making pie crust?
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Tagged with: blade • kitchenaid food processor • pastry blender • pie crust
Filed under: Food Processors
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When you’re making pie crust you want to keep the butter cold as you mix it. A food processor can beat it so hard it warms up so the butter melts and you get tough pie crust. So you have to be careful, just pulse it, don’t let it heat up. Otherwise it would probably be okay.
I think so, yes, cos I certainly do. You don’t have much to lose by trying it.
yes
I have used a pastry cutter for years. It is great, but you have to be skilled and know what you are doing. Also, if the blades on the cutter are not fine or sharp then you will have trouble cutting the butter/crisco into the flour.
The food processor is actually the best. I started using one about a year ago. It is great because it can pulse the fat and flour together into a fine sand. This is what you want. Then you can add a bit of water to make the pie crust.
The finer the cut the more steam when it bakes. This gets you a very flaky pie crust.
The other reason a food processor works so well is it is fast. This does not allow the fat to melt.