The 7 Best Substitutes for Pie Weight

Pie weights are one of those annoying kitchen gadgets that you either never buy because you don’t use them enough, or you lose them all the time. In any case, there never seems to be any when you need it most!

Pie weights are, however, an essential tool for blind baking pies and crusts. They help push the crust to prevent air bubbles from forming and so the crust bakes evenly.

Luckily, even if you don’t have this particular product, there are plenty of substitutes for them.

So what are the best substitutes for pie weights? Our top recommendations are raw dried beans, uncooked raw rice, and granulated sugar. You can also use glass marbles or polished river rocks, another smaller pie plate inserted into the larger one, change coins such as pennies, or other metal objects.

All of these substitutes are oven-safe, easy to find, use, and clean, and most importantly, they will conduct heat evenly and create a nice, flat pastry crust.

In today’s article, we’ll look at the various substitutes for traditional pie weights and exactly how to use them. But first we will talk about what exactly they are, how they work and how to choose a suitable replacement.

What are pie weights?

If you’re new to baking, you may have never heard of pie weights, or you may have just read about it in a recipe but have no idea what they are or why they’re used.

Aspect

Pie weights are incredibly useful tools for making any type of dough or crust. First of all, let’s look at its shape. Cake weights are weighted balls made of ceramic or metal.

They are not very large and are about 3/8 inch in diameter per ball. However, they are used in large quantities (you will see why shortly) and are sold in different packages classified by weight.

The heavier the weight, the more balls you will have and naturally the larger the surface they will be able to cover.

These balls are available in a wide variety of colors, but most often you will find them in stone white, cream or grey.

These balls are easy to use, don’t require any washing (or at least that often), and are reusable for years, often even decades.

uses

So now that we’ve seen what they look like, let’s talk about their uses, including why they’re really necessary!

When making a dough or crust (for tarts and quiches), the dough itself naturally contains moisture. When you bake this crust, the moisture will evaporate, creating steam and ultimately air pockets.

While many pies need these air pockets (like puff pastry, for example), a ton of crusts don’t and need to have a denser texture.

By adding weights to the dough when baking, the dough will not be able to rise at all and no bags will form. You will have a perfectly flat, dense and even puff pastry crust.

This method of cooking the crusts is called blind cooking.

So in summary, pie weights will help you blind bake crusts perfectly. They’ll help prevent air bubbles from forming and leave the crust perfectly flat and evenly baked.

It will also help prevent the crust from shrinking during baking, especially the sides.

How to Blind Bake Crusts and Pies

Blind baking is an essential part of making many tarts, quiches, and other pastries. As we mentioned, you need pie weights to perform this method.

To blind bake, you just have to line the pan with the tart dough , making sure that it covers the entire surface and that the dough is pressed into the corners.

Next, take a piece of baking paper and place it on the dough. Fill the paper with your pie weights, making sure it fills all the corners.

Bake the dough for about 10-20 minutes. The blind bake time will depend on the type of dough you use, the overall size of the pie, and the thickness of the rolled crust.

Once the dough is blind baked, the filling is added and the tart or quiche is baked until the filling is set. This usually takes another 15-30 minutes, depending on the filling and its size.

Choosing the best substitutes

So finally, we come to the substitution part! When choosing a substitute for pie crusts, the most important thing to consider is whether the substitute is oven-safe.

This, in our opinion, is even more important than the weight of the object.

If your substitute can’t handle the heat of the oven, there’s no point in using it. You have to use something that can withstand temperatures of at least 200°C (390°F) without changing weight or shape.

Then, secondly, you have to look at the weight of the… well, weight! Most ovens have some type of fan that evenly distributes the heat.

If, for example, you use flour, it will blow all over the oven and not really weigh the dough.

A better option are ingredients like rice, beans, or other types of metal weights like pans , all of which won’t move easily despite circulating air.

And lastly, make sure your substitute has a bit of shelf life. Let’s use the flour example again; if you were to use it in the oven as a weight, it would just darken and eventually burn. You cannot continuously use it over and over again.

A better substitute would then be something that doesn’t change shape in the oven, like rice, or again, beans.

Tips and Tricks for Using Pie Weights

Before we dive into all the substitutes we’ve put together for you, we’re going to cover some tips and tricks you can put into practice when baking your pie crusts.

Remember that it is always important to use baking paper, parchment paper, or even aluminum foil between the pie crust and the pie weights (regardless of which you choose to use).

This layer will help you handle the weights better, keep them together, and most importantly prevent them from getting contaminated by the weights.

We always prefer to use parchment paper. This is simply because some sheets can discolor the dough or even cause indentations.

To get a good, even coating on a cake pan, take a large piece of parchment paper, roll it into a ball, then fold it again. These folds will help you get the weights into the smallest corners. A straight piece of paper cannot bend as well.

Always use a larger piece of parchment paper (or an alternate sheet). The paper should stick out quite a bit from the edges of the plate you’ve chosen.

This is mainly for two reasons. One, it makes the weights much easier to handle, especially if they are small pieces like sugar or rice.

And second, it helps prevent any of those tiny sugar or rice granules from spilling into the batter . Sugar, especially, is nearly impossible to completely remove from the batter once it’s poured out.

Lastly, always remember that these pie weights get hot. Some, especially metal ones, can retain heat very well and can burn you quite a bit. Always allow the dough to cool slightly before handling the weights.

Also, use the baking paper layer to remove the still hot weights without touching them.

The Best Substitutes for Pie Weights

So now that we’ve explained exactly why you need pie weights, how to use them, and how to choose substitutes, let’s take a look at our top 7 recommendations!

1. Dried beans

This is by far the best type of food replacement you can use for pie weights.

Dried beans are extremely easy to find and very affordable. Compared to other substitutes and even the pie scales themselves, their cost is a fraction; you may even already have some old beans lying around your pantry at home.

We have yet to find any type of bean that doesn’t work as a pie weight. Just about any bean you find will have enough heat resistance to maintain its shape and weight.

We always use brightly colored beans, such as black, red or pinto. This is because they are very easy to distinguish from the pale dough, especially if you have smaller broken pieces.

In addition, of course, we also like to use the larger types of beans. They are easier to clean and store than legumes like lentils.

If you accidentally spill lentils, it will take quite a while to clean them from the batter, while beans can be cleaned more easily.

What’s even better about using beans as pie weights is that you can still use them for eating after about 3 uses. This makes them a fantastic substitute if you don’t want to invest in expensive weights.

2. Dry rice

After the beans, we love to use raw and uncooked rice, you know, the hard granules. As with the beans, you can use any type of rice that you have in your pantry or that you can find in the supermarket.

Rice is another type of food that can withstand the heat of the oven without changing its shape, color, or even flavor.

You can easily reuse the rice after a couple of uses to make a delicious pilaf or risotto. It will add a roasted flavor to your dish.

The only thing we’ll say about using rice as a substitute for blind cooking is that it makes a mess if you spill it.

We always recommend making the parchment liner (the one between the dough and the weights) much larger than the actual pie plate. It should protrude a lot from the edges, even if they are high.

This will help you hold all the tiny rice granules and even regular pie weights. It makes it so much easier to remove them from the cake and decant them into your container.

Another thing to keep in mind is that these dumbbells get quite hot, so the paper will help you handle them easily.

3. Granulated sugar

Another food, and the last one on today’s list, is granulated white (or brown) sugar. What makes sugar such an amazing cake weight is that it is a fantastic heat distributor.

Due to its small granule size, it mixes well and can reach every corner. This means it will easily cover every inch of dough and distribute heat evenly to all areas.

We love using white granulated sugar, but you can also use brown granulated sugar. Neither will melt in the heat of the oven, but they will toast and taste more like caramel, especially white sugar.

This sugar can easily be reused in various recipes, and it will add a much more complex and deeper flavor, which is a must try!

Try to stay away from wet sugars, like muscovado, simply because of their moisture content. The syrup that creates the moisture in the muscovado sugar will completely melt and run everywhere.

It’s not necessarily a bad substitute, but it’s too annoying to clean and expensive.

Also stay away from castor sugar, palm sugar or coconut sugar, simply because they are too expensive to use for this purpose.

Don’t use artificial sweeteners either, as they tend to have a fine powdery texture . These types of products are too light to put in the oven and will fall apart when the air circulates.

Also, they are too expensive to use as weights: buy weights then!

4. Glass marbles

Yes! Glass marbles! You know, the ones that are used to decorate, or even the ones that your children play with! They make excellent pie weights. They have a lot of weight and are easy to use, clean and store.

First of all, always remember to wash your marbles before using them with food. Even if they appear clean, wash them well with lukewarm water.

One very important thing to keep in mind is that some marbles can crack in the kiln, not all but some. It all depends on the type and quality of the marbles.

A great alternative to marbles is polished river rock . They cannot be rough, as the rough edges can break off and fall into your pastry, creating a gritty product that may also be unsafe to eat.

Polished river stones conduct heat well and also distribute it evenly and effectively.

5. Another pie plate

This is such an obvious and easy method that it’s surprising more people don’t come up with it.

If you don’t have any of the above substitutes or just don’t want to use them, all you have to do is insert a slightly smaller sized pie pan.

It has arguably the best weight compared to any other substitute, and it will distribute it evenly. A pie pan is also definitely ovenproof and an excellent heat distributor, which means that its entire surface will bake evenly.

To use this substitute, you can follow the same method as with the others. You just have to line the dough with baking paper so that it protrudes over the edges, and then place the other pan inside.

Your second pie pan shouldn’t be too small, but it shouldn’t be hard on the sides of the dough either.

6. Cents

Most people have some jar, drawer, or pocket full of random coins. You can also use them as weights!

The coins are very heavy and fully heat resistant, so they will hold up perfectly in the oven. And what makes them great too is that you don’t need a lot to have enough weight.

As with the other substitutes, be sure to wash the pennies or change them before using them as pie weights. Although they will still have dirt and debris, at least most of it will have been removed.

Again, line the dough with parchment paper before placing the change on top. The change can stain the puff pastry and leave it with a metallic taste if you touch it directly.

7. Metal objects

There are a few examples of metal objects that we wanted to mention specifically in this category, the first being metal chains. Metal is a fantastic conductor of heat and often has a bit of weight to it. 

In the specific case of metal chains, they are easy to use, move and clean. Make sure you have a chain that is heavy and large enough to cover the entire area well.

However, your chain should not be too heavy so as not to create indentations in the dough.

The next metal object is steel balls. These will work much like regular pie weights, but are made of metal.

They will certainly help hold the dough during blind baking time, and will help distribute the heat evenly.

You can also use other metal objects, you just have to make sure they are safe to use in the oven.