I haven't made any pies but I did get an Apple pie at Sam's club on Wednesday ($5 how can you pass that up) and a half a blueberry pie from whole foods tonight. Had both with vanilla ice cream and both were delicious.
AFAIK, unless you're making something where the filling is chilled/unbaked you would never bake a crust blind. So like cream pies (NO JOKES FELLAS) and the like you would cook the crust before. Then you need to keep it weighted so it doesn't rise/crack/get rekt m8.
Yeah what he said. I have some pie weights and you want to dock the crust with a fork to keep it from puffing up too much in the middle as well. Lacking pie weights, you can use lentils or dried beans or whatever.
One of my favorite things about shortcake is the interplay of texture and temperature. Hot flaky short cake with cold whipped cream and strawberries. I also like to only sugar about half the berries so there are still some nice and fresh and crisp. Such a perfect summer dessert. And you only need to back for like 10 minutes instead of for an hour.