How to Make a Lattice Top for a Pie Crust

Name: How To Make a Lattice Top for a Pie Crust
Prep time: 20 min
Total time: 20 min
Ingredients: 1 batch pie dough , enough for top and bottom crusts

In This Recipe

Best Glazes for Lattice Crust
Keeping Your Lattice Crust from Burning

A woven lattice pie crust can make a homemade pie look so pretty. As intimidating as it might look to the non-weavers among us, weaving a lattice top pie crust is actually quite easy to do. Watch out though, you might experience flashbacks of kindergarten crafts and construction paper.

Overhead view of a lattice top pie. — Sally Vargas

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Watch This Lattice Pie Crust Recipe

Best Glazes for Lattice Pie Crusts

To get the beautifully browned pie crust, brush the lattice with some milk, cream, or an egg wash (an egg whisked together with a tablespoon of water). You'll want the egg yolk to be completely incorporated into the liquid, and the egg wash thin enough to flow from a pastry brush onto the dough strips.

Whatever glaze you use, you can sprinkle the whole lattice pie top with some sanding or turbinado sugar. It adds sparkle and crunch to the baked pie.

How Do You Keep Your Lattice Pie Crust from Burning?

You want that beautifully browned pie crust, but the edges of the pie may brown faster than the rest of the pie. You can buy a pie shield, but it's easy to make your own from aluminum foil. Cut off a piece large enough to cover your whole pie. Fold and cut out a piece to cover the edges. An easy step-by-step tutorial is available here.

Bake the pie as directed, but remove the foil during the last 20 minutes of baking so the edges can brown as well.

If your lattice pie top browns too much before the filling is fully baked, loosely tent the pie with a large piece of foil and poke a hole in the middle for venting the steam. You want your pie crust to still be nice and flaky, not steamed!

How To Make a Lattice Top for a Pie Crust

Prep Time 20 mins

Total Time 20 mins

Serving 1 serving

Yield 1 pie

Our perfect pie dough recipe is ideal for lattice crusts. But in general, almost any pie crust recipe will do.

If you don't have a food processor, try our handmade pie crust recipe (no special equipment needed).

1 batch pie dough, enough for top and bottom crusts

Prepare the dough:

Before starting the lattice top, roll out half of your pie dough and line your pie dish with it. The dough should extend beyond the rim of the pie dish by about 1/2 inch. Put it in the refrigerator to chill while you work on the lattice. On a lightly floured surface, roll out the other half of your pie dough to the same extent as the first half (about 3 inches beyond the diameter of your pie dish). It's easier to work with the dough if it is chilled, so if it the dough has softened too much, put the rolled-out piece on a flat cookie sheet and chill it in the refrigerator or freezer for a few minutes.
Cut the dough into even strips:

Cut the dough into even strips, 1/2 inch to 3/4 inch wide, depending on how thick you want your lattice strips. You can use a blunt knife with or without a ruler or straight edge to guide you, or you can use a pizza wheel or a pastry wheel if you have one.

Sally Vargas
Fill your pie, lay down the strips:

Fill your pie shell with the pie filling. Lay out 4 to 7 parallel strips of the pie dough, depending on how thick your strips are, on top of the filling, with about 1/2 inch to 3/4 inch space between them. Fold back every other strip.

Sally Vargas

Sally Vargas

Sally Vargas
Start weaving the cross strips:

Place one long strip of dough perpendicular to the parallel strips as shown. Unfold the folded strips over the perpendicular strip.

Sally Vargas
Fold and weave parallel strips:

Now take the parallel strips that are running underneath the perpendicular strip and fold them back over the perpendicular strip, as shown. Lay down a second perpendicular strip of dough next to the first strip, with some space between the strips. Unfold the folded parallel strips over the second strip.

Sally Vargas

Sally Vargas
Continue weaving and finish:

Continue this process until the weave is complete over the top of the pie.

Sally Vargas

Sally Vargas
Trim the dough and crimp the edges:

Trim the edges of the strips flush with the dough of the underlying pie dish, which should be about half an inch over the sides. Fold back the rim of the shell over the edge of the lattice strips, and crimp to secure.

Sally Vargas

Sally Vargas

Sally Vargas
Bake until browned:

Bake pie as directed in your recipe. Let cook for at least an hour before serving.

Sally Vargas

Nutrition Facts (per serving)
2584	Calories
146g	Fat
290g	Carbs
27g	Protein

Nutrition Facts
Servings: 1
Amount per serving
Calories	2584
% Daily Value*
Total Fat 146g	188%
Saturated Fat 51g	253%
Cholesterol 0mg	0%
Sodium 2375mg	103%
Total Carbohydrate 290g	106%
Dietary Fiber 14g	51%
Total Sugars 13g
Protein 27g
Vitamin C 0mg	0%
Calcium 88mg	7%
Iron 11mg	61%
Potassium 518mg	11%
*The % Daily Value (DV) tells you how much a nutrient in a food serving contributes to a daily diet. 2,000 calories a day is used for general nutrition advice.

Nutrition information is calculated using an ingredient database and should be considered an estimate. In cases where multiple ingredient alternatives are given, the first listed is calculated for nutrition. Garnishes and optional ingredients are not included.