My grandmother's recipe. Pie crust has an undeserved reputation as being difficult to make. It isn’t. But there are important points that aren’t usually included in recipes, so I’ll include them below. You may use a vegetable shortening, or you may use half lard (or shortening) and half butter, though the crumb will be shorter. Read more . Do not try to make a pie crust with all butter; if you want to use all butter, go with a short crust instead. Too much fat makes the crust shrink when you bake it (if you’ve ever used those pre-made crusts from the store, they always shrink because they contain too high a proportion of fat). Too much flour will make your crust tough, which most people know. But too much water will also make your crust tough — and most people use too much water. The überprinciple here is handle the dough as gently and as little as possible!