Cosy Chicken Pie

Ingredients

Serves 3-4 ⁣

Cosy Chicken Pie:

• ~2 tbsp butter
• 1 trimmed leek, sliced into half-moons 
• 350g chicken breast, slices 1cm wide 
• 2 bay leaves (torn up and stems removed)
• 3 sprigs of thyme, picked apart
• 1/4 of a whole nutmeg, grated
• bunch of spring onions (save 1 for the pea dish)
• 1/2 courgette, chopped into small chunks
• 2 generous tbsps of crème fraîche (or 2 tbsps of cream or cream cheese)
• 1 tbsp mustard (I use English)
• 1 tbsp flour
• 300ml of chicken stock (or vegetable)
• puff or shortcrust pastry (see below for cheesy shortcrust or prerolled shop-bought is a great time saver)
• milk or egg to brush with pastry with

Cheesy shortcrust pastry: 

• 200g plain flour
• 50g butter
• 50g cheddar cheese (just crumble this in or grate)
• pinch of salt 
• 80g of cold water

Pea and Spinach dish:

• ~1-2 tbsp butter
• 1 spring onion
• 1 tbsp flour
• 250g frozen peas
• 300 ml of vegetable stock
• 2 large handfuls spinach, chopped into ribbons
• 1 tbsp of crème fraîche (optional) (or 1 tbsp of cream, yoghurt or cream cheese)

Method

First make the pastry (or skip this if using shop-bought). Add the flour and salt to a bowl, followed by the butter and cheese. Crumble with your hands the butter and cheese with the flour until you have a consistent texture throughout, this takes 2-3 mins (option to use a food processor but it tastes better by hand!). Add the cold water and bring the mixture together to form a dough, but don't knead it much at all, just gently press it together enough to form one lump (kneading will toughen it up). Wrap the dough in clingfilm then pop it in the fridge for at least 30mins. 

Preheat the oven to 180c (fan). 

To make the pie filling you can do this in a separate frying pan to the pie dish as I chose to, or if using a metal pie dish then you can do it all in here to save pans. Start by frying the leeks in the butter to soften them for 2 mins then add the chicken and cook until all the pink has disappeared from the outside. Add the bay leaves, thyme, nutmeg, spring onions and courgette and stir it all together. Add the crème fraîche, mustard, flour, stock and season with salt and pepper then mix it all together well, turn the heat down low now and leave it to bubble.

Get the pasty out of the fridge and roll it out on a flour sprinkled worksurface, only rolling away from yourself. Add the pie filling to your pie dish (if it is not in it already) then place the rolled out pastry on top. Using your thumb and index finger to gently pinch the edges so it folds itself to fit the shape of the pan (lightly greasing the top of the pan with butter helps with serving). Make some cute leaves or flowers with the leftover pastry and drizzle some olive oil on a few sprigs of rosemary for decoration. Brush the pastry with egg or milk then cook in the oven for around 30mins or until the pastry is a golden brown.

While the pie cooks, make the pea and spinach dish. In a frying pan (I used the same one as for the pie filling) melt the butter then add the spring onion for 1 minute before adding the flour and mixing it together well. Add the peas and stock and bring to the boil. After 5-7 mins add the spinach, once this has wilted add the crème fraîche and let it melt in, season with salt. Topping this with some mint leaves to serve is a nice touch and goes so well with it.

Serve the pie with the pea dish and maybe some mash potato and enjoy! x