Chicken, Sage and Pumpkin Pie

When I think of winter dishes I think of hearty soups and casseroles and of course pies!! This pie is really quick and easy and is packed with flavour.

 This recipe makes a medium pie (for 2)
What you will need:
200g pumpkin, cut into 2cm pieces
3/4 chicken breast or roast chicken, cut into 2cm pieces
Olive Oil
Garlic clove, crushed
1/2 brown onion, chopped
25g plain flour
25g butter
200g chicken stock
1/4 cup chopped sage leaves
1 sheet puff pastry
egg/milk to brush pastry

How to create:
- Oven to 180 degrees
- Place pumpkin onto a tray and drizzle with oil 
- In a frying pan, add some oil then cook chicken until cooked through, remove from pan
- Add butter to pan and melt, add onion and garlic, cook until soft 
- In a small bowl, make a paste with the flour and some of the chicken stock, add this to the onion mixture, cook for a couple of mins
- Add the rest of the stock to the pan, stir well and make sure there are no lumps, bring to the boil then remove from heat
- Put chicken in a bowl with pumpkin and sage, season and then add to the stock mixture
- Pour pie mixture into pie dish and cover with pastry, trim sides if you want or leave them if you want a bit more pastry to have with your filling
- Brush with egg or milk and prick a few holes in the top 
- Bake in the oven for about 30-40 mins or until pastry is cooked and golden
- Serve with roasted veggies

Spiced Indian Pies

This is one of my favourites and you can have a bit of fun with the spices as well. It's one of those simple dishes that are easy, no fuss and they are delicious hot or cold.

You will need:
- A good handful of diced zucchini, pumpkin, sweet potato, cherry tomatoes and fennel (or any of you favourite vegetables, like eggplant etc)
- Short crust pastry (1 sheet will make 4 small-med tarts)
- Olive oil
- Garlic cloves (up to you how many)
- Milk
- 6 curry leaves (fresh are best, but dried work fine)
- Paprika/cayenne pepper


Spice mix:
- 1/2 tsp cumin seeds
- 1/2 tsp coriander seeds
- chilli flakes
- salt and pepper
- 1/4 tsp garam marsala


For yoghurt mix:
- Natural yoghurt
- A good squeeze of lemon juice
- Cucumber, finely chopped

How to create:
- Defrost pastry sheet(s)
- Combine all vegetables in a bowl, drizzle with oil
- Put spice mix in a mortar and pestle and crush together
- Sprinkle the spice mix over veggies and stir to coat them all, add the curry leaves
- Place on a baking tray and bake for about 40 mins, or until cooked through 
- Cut the pastry into quarters and put a good spoonful of the veggie mixture into the
centre, twist the sides in a clockwise format to create a case around the veggies
- Brush the edges of the pastry with milk and sprinkle with paprika or cayenne pepper
- Bake at 180 for about 15-20 mins or until the pastry is cooked and golden
- For the yoghurt mixture, combine all ingredients in a bowl


Serve these delicious pies with a dollop of the yoghurt mixture and a nice fresh salad.


All I can say to that, is YUM!!

Sunday Night Splendour to Weeknight Treasure.

Sunday night Shanks provided mass leftovers and you can only have shanks a couple of times in a row before needing a change on the palette. So with that I purchased some puff pastry and vegetable stock and decided to make pies. With the leftovers, i cut the meat to decent portion sizes (and enjoyed feasting on the bones before throwing them in the bin), I added some stock to form a gravy, then I added a couple of tbls of flour. I put pastry into a muffin tray and made mini pies. They were amazing, I even attempted a potato pie- which was slightly messy but tasted great.