Chicken & Mushroom Pie
I love this on a winter's night! Unless i'm making this for friends, i tend to leave out the pastry and either have it with some crispy bread or with some steamed greens or potatoes... anything really. (Don't judge it by the picture!)
This serves 4 and takes about 45 minutes all up.
Ingredients
6 chicken thigh fillets, cut into 3 cm pieces
1 brown onion, finely chopped (or 1 leak thinly sliced, white part only)
400 g cup mushrooms, sliced
1 garlic clove, crushed
4 thyme sprigs (leaves only)
300 ml chicken stock
1 tsp Dijon mustard
1 heaped tbs flour (gluten free)
30 g butter
2 heaped Tbs thickened cream
salt and pepper to taste
1 sheet puff pastry
*for some added veg, you can add 1 grated zucchini and grated carrot when you add the chicken stock
Method
In a large pan cook the onions with a little oil on medium heat until softened (3 minutes). Add the chicken pieces and turn the heat up to brown slightly (5 minutes) . Remove and set aside.
In the same pan, add the mushrooms and cook until they have released their liquid and are starting to go golden (7-10 minutes). Add the garlic and thyme and chicken and cook for further 2 minutes until flavours are combined.
Meanwhile, in a mug, add the butter and flour and cook in the microwave for 1 minute, at 30 second intervals. Add chicken stock and simmer on medium high heat until the liquid reduces by half (3 - 5 minutes). At this point add the Dijon mustard and flour and butter mixture.
This will start to thicken the mixture so add the cream and salt and pepper to taste. Bring back to heat. You can add a little boiling water if you think there doesn't seem to be enough sauce.
Tip contents into an oven safe dish and top with puff pastry and cook in a preheated 180C fan forced oven fro 20-30 minutes until the pastry is golden. (I use milk to brush over my pastry instead of an egg wash - does pretty much the same thing without wasting an egg!)
If you're pressed for time, you can also cut the puff pastry into rounds, (or any shape really) and cook it separately and just serve it all 'deconstructed'. You'll just need to take the sauce to the consistency you like as it does thicken more in the oven. .Simply place the chicken mixture in a bowl and top with puff pastry!
If you're going to have this without the pastry and are serving over mash or with vegies, then cook the mixture down on the stove top until sauce thickens a little more. (Without the pastry, the mixture tastes just as good the next day!)
Tips
You need to 'cook out' the flour before adding it to the liquid. In fact, any time you're adding flour to thicken any sauce, you should always 'cook' it out and I find this easiest and quickest to do in the microwave.
