Family Beef Pot Pie

If you have been following this blog you will have already read several posts regarding homemade soups. The reason being homemade soups are one of the most frugal meals you can make. A soup can easily be turned into a thick, stew consistency simply by adding a thickener. The thicken "stoup" as Rachel Ray would call a soup that eats like a stew, can then be used as the basis of a casserole. A thicken stew-like consistency can be used as the filling for meat pies. This allows you a lot of creative leeway when it comes to making meat pies!

Family Beef Pot Pie

Meat pies consist of either one crust or two crust pies with meat and/or vegetable filling with the consistency of a thick stew. For a two crust meat pie I recommend my Favourite Pie Crust. This dough freezes nicely either formed into shells, rolled or ready to roll. If you are making a one crust meat pie you can also use the same pie crust recipe or you can cheat a bit by using a pre-made puff pastry dough found in the freezer section of your grocery store. Do keep a few packages of puffy pastry on hand as it is a very versatile dough that can be used for both savoury and sweet dishes. While I have made puff pastry from scratch it is one convenience food that I recommend buying pre-made simply because making homemade puff pastry is a bit more tedious and time consuming than making a standard pastry dough. If you would like to try making your own you can try this method.

Pictured is the family sized beef pot pie I made a few nights ago using puff pastry for the top crust. I should have used a smaller casserole dish but wanted to use up all of the filling. Using a smaller casserole dish would have given an even, rolled edge around the pot pie something that is desirable. This is something I will avoid the next time simply for the visual effect.

Beef Pot Pie

Pictured is the cut pot pie. The crust serves as a substitute for bread in this meal. It is nice and flaky, perfect for this purpose. I used a ground beef filling for this pot pie.

Two thing I look for in any stew or stew based filling aside of flavour is texture and colour. In general corn, carrots and green beans pop on the background of meat, potatoes, mushrooms and gravy. Here's how I made the filling:

Method: Brown two pounds extra lean ground beef. Wash and steam unpeeled potato pieces. Sautée portebello mushrooms in butter. Place browned ground beef in large mixing bow. Stir in cooked potato pieces and mushrooms. Stir in 1 - 500 ml jar home canned green beans or equivalent. Stir in about two cups of frozen corn niblets. Pour about 3 cups homemade gravy oven the mixture and stir in. Pour the mixture into a casserole dish. Cover with puff pastry. Bake at 180ºC (350ºF) until the crust is golden brown and filling bubbles.