Tuesday 7 January 2014

Telly ... Brain ... Plate ... Chicken Pie


While I was doing some research for the Bloggers Around the World South Africa, I came across Masterchef South Africa. Did I tell you this before or am I having a déjà vu? Oh ... either way it would mean my brain is not functioning properly. That wasn't what I wanted to get to.
Anyway, in that episode the contestants where supposed to visit a restaurant, sample a dish and then cook it. Something like that I like as well. Fine, for one team it was chicken pie. From that moment I fancied to make chicken pie. 
Apparently that was about one month ago.
Now I like to share with you what got to my plate after it went from the telly through my (malfunctioning?) brain ...
There remained just a vague idea on what had to be done with what.



Chicken was obvious. What else? We'll see ...

Ingredients:
500 g chicken breast, small cubes or chopped or ...?
Olive oil
Salt, Pepper
Juice of one lime
200 g mushrooms, coarsely chopped
1 onion, finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
200 g crème fraîche
Bunch of parsley
400 g puff pastry
1 egg, whisked

Reconstruction:
Let's start with seasoning the cubed chicken pieces with salt and pepper and frying them in a bit of olive oil. When you feel they are ready add the lime juice and cook it away. Then remove the chicken from the pan.
Now fry the onion and garlic in the pan. When the onions are translucent add the meat back together with the crème fraîche and the parsley. Simmer until the whole mixture thickens and isn't that wet anymore.
Get your puff pastry ready now. At this point you have to decide where you want to go, whether you want to have one big chicken pie or several small individual ones. I decided to go for one small and one big one. The smaller one looked better in the end, so I like to feature that one then.
Slightly oil your dishes and fit in puff pastry. You can cut away the pastry that protrudes over the edges. Then stuff in portions of the filling accordingly.



Fit a lid of pastry on each pie, making sure, it is properly sealed.



Brush the lid with egg wash. Do you see the difference in the next picture?



Then the pies are ready to go to the oven, which has been preheated to 200 °C. Leave them in the oven for 30 minutes or until they are golden brown.
I decided to serve them with some simple rocket and tomato salad. Fine, some black olives and Parmesan, too. I loved it, the pie was very delicious ... at least to my palate.



What do you think? Do you want one? In that case you have to do your own. At least you could have a look at the recipe instead of just doing in from what you saw on telly.
Have you ever tried to cook something you saw on telly from memory? What are your experiences?

I think, it's a lot of fun. Speaking of which, I can't add that dish anymore to the Bloggers Around the World South Africa, but ... hey ... I don't need to, there are plenty more lovely blog challenges, like ... eh ... eh ... eh ... of course ... Lavender & Lovage's Cooking with Herbs challenge. When you use herbs you can just enter every month ... even more than once.


Cooking with Herbs

And it is just coincidence the theme for January is CITRUS. Although this is not obligatory it ... eh ... fits anyway. Off we go ...


10 comments:

  1. I'd be more than happy to tuck into one of those lush mini pies.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I can so imagine that. They are best eaten fresh, of course.

      Delete
  2. I LOVE pie Chris and this is absolutely lovely! I am SOOOO sorry I missed your South African month for recipes, and I was born there too, but we went away for Christmas in the end and I ran out of time.......Happy New Year! Karen

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you! No worries, I know how it is. I hope you had a good start for the year and everything is fine with you and you don't have too much stress now.

      Delete
  3. I absolutely love pies - I've never had one with lime in it though as I wouldn't have though to pair that with the pastry but it looks and sounds delicious.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks! It is good indeed to love pies. I really should have them more often. About the lime, I don't know. It was just sitting there screaming "Choose me! Choose me!" ... and so I did.

      Delete
  4. I really like the idea of this pie. I usually cheat with TV recipes, and replay them online, so I can go back and forth if I forget stuff, or to look at the next step in detail.
    I have made a few recipes from memory though. Some of them, like my Lebanese Chickpea and Lemon stew, were more made up than memory, but they usually work out ok in the end.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh, of course I could have looked back, since I had he TV show recorded as well, but somehow I didn't bother looking. As you say, thing usually work out in the end.

      Delete
  5. Lovely dish ~ Would love to see this submitted to FoodFotoGallery.com for all to see :-)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh, that would be an honour ... I have a go ...

      Delete

Why not leave a comment!? I love to receive messages.