Cinnamon Roll Pie Crust

[Toliver]

I'm sure this may be old hat to some of you but I've never seen this before.

"Cinnamon roll pie crust puts a brilliant spin on the late-summer pie season"

I thought it looks awesome and I'm sure it tastes just as awesome. From the short article:

Quote

Cinnamon roll pie crust is store-bought pie crust rolled out, layered with cinnamon sugar and then rolled back into a cylinder. Slice the cinnamon spirals into discs, flatten them into a pie crust and make the prettiest pie crust you ever did see.

It makes me wonder, though, if an apple pie or pumpkin pie baked in such a crust would be too much spice.

Perhaps something simpler, like a vanilla custard pie, would be better so the crust would add to and not compete with the pie filling.

Still, the crust sounds intriguing...

[Lisa Shock]

I see four issues:

 

1) The effect is mostly hidden when filled, unless you use a glass pie pan and hold it up in the air for guests to admire. You could make a top crust by making a sheet of the dough, however, the cinnamon sugar swirls will melt away when heated, leaving circular holes and a lot of weird looking concentric rings of dough floating on the fruit. -If you are lucky. If your fruit collapses a lot and leaves an air gap, the top crust will simply collapse into a mess some time in the second half of the bake.

 

2) The cinnamon sugar will cause the crust to stick to the pan.

 

3) Once the bottom of the pie and gets hot enough, the cinnamon sugar will become liquid and flow to the bottom, under the crust, leaving a lot of circular gaps in the crust through which filling can move through/under. Even if you egg wash it before baking and blind bake it, you will have issues. Also, if you blind bake, you will not be able to use pie weights; they will get messy with liquid sugar and stick to the crust.

 

4) The additional manipulation of the dough in making this will probably damage the dough structure. The commercial pie crust stuff is weird enough to begin with, moving it around and smashing it with hot hands can't help anything. So, it will definitely be less flaky.

 

What the author(s) of this article don't know is that professional bakers don't just use cinnamon and sugar for cinnamon filling. There's usually some bread flour (gluten helps bind), butter (flavor and to act as a dough conditioner on the edges of the pastry dough it comes in contact with), bakery crumbs (gluten, flavors, overall texture, prevents flowing), ground nuts (flavor, crunch), egg (binding agent). This idea would work better and stick less with a real filling. That said, when was the last time you got a good look at the bottom of a slice of pie???

 

This 'tip' represents what I really hate about Pinterest. People purposefully designing something for the photograph that doesn't work well in real life.

 

Honestly, if you want flavored crust, save yourself a LOT of time and effort and add spices to dough as you make it. I usually put a small amount of nutmeg in pie crust and pate sucre. Cinnamon and other spices would be good, as would a small amount of almond flour. Keep the amount of sugar low to prevent sticking, and to prevent it from flowing into the filling and leaving the crust with gaps.

[JeanneCake]

What she said. ^^^

 

 

[JeanneCake]

I went and clicked on the link.  Eww was my first reaction, but I should admit that I have never bought a package of the pie crust stuff (and nor have I bought the stuff in the cans that you smash against the counter and it splits open.  I don't know what it is (biscuits?) but if it's going to behave like that snake-in-a-can toy, you shouldn't eat it.

 

And that last photo doesn't even show the crust, so what's the point?   Lisa's right - I vote make your own spiced crust too.

 

[JoNorvelleWalker]

2 hours ago, Lisa Shock said:

That said, when was the last time you got a good look at the bottom of a slice of pie???

 

You never dropped a slice of pie?

 

[Lisa Shock]

4 hours ago, JoNorvelleWalker said:

 

You never dropped a slice of pie?

 

 

*gasp* I'm going to have nightmares now, nightmares!!! Don't scare me like that!

 

I always keep the plate really close to the pie pan, usually hovering right over it. Closest I have come is having a slice break apart; chunks either fall on the plate or back in the pan, no pie wasted! (the washing-up person gets to eat fragments or else they get saved for post-party solo snacking)

 

In general, I don't get much of anything on the floor. One thing culinary school was good for was training us in neatness. That, and I used to compete in the ACF, and once again, neatness = points. Once in a great while a bit of something raw will go flying off my peeler, a raw potato slice hit the floor tonight, but, it's a RARE occurance -maybe 2-3 times a year.

 

Pie on the floor!!! -Nightmares, I tell you, nightmares!

[Quesmoy]

I have actually tried this piecrust, and just like was suggested it burned a little and stuck to the pie plate. I never thought about adding a little spice to my piecrust white naked, but that is a much better idea.

[blue_dolphin]

1 hour ago, Quesmoy said:

I never thought about adding a little spice to my piecrust white naked....

 

This is such a great line . I keep trying to compose a response but it stands on its own so well - nothing I could say would improve it!  Thank you! 

[Anna N]

12 minutes ago, blue_dolphin said:

 

This is such a great line . I keep trying to compose a response but it stands on its own so well - nothing I could say would improve it!  Thank you! 

I am not sure of the meaning.  I can't decide whether the poster makes piecrusts wearing no clothes or whether the piecrust is naked without some spice. I'm not sure I want to go either place.