Musings from the kitchen sink

I'd like to share this great recipe for Chicken and Mushroom Pie... With my one blog follower. Yes Lenka, John assures me that you are the only person who reads my blog. I know there are more of you out there. He's deluded. We all know that.

So... you (all of you) will need:
550g chicken thigh fillets, trimmed and chopped
1/3 cup wholemeal flour
70g butter (or olive oil, whatever)
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, crushed
275g button mushroooms, halved (or any mushies. I'm not fussy)
1 cup chicken stock
1/4 cup sage leaves and rosemary, finely chopped
sea salt
2-3 sheets ready-rolled puff pastry
1 egg, lightly beaten (or rice milk)

Method:

• preheat oven to 200 degrees C.
• toss the chopped chicken with the flour and it is coated.
• melt half butter in large frying pan and brown chicken well. Remove and set aside.
• melt remaining butter in same pan, add onion and garlic and cook over low-medium heat until the onion is soft. Add mushies and continue cooking until mushies are slightly cooked.
• add the stock and stir until the mixture boils. Return the chicken to the pan, add sage and rosemary and salt to taste, stir with love, then turn the heat down and simmer for 5-10 mins or until mixture thickens. Remove from heat and allow to cool. (I never really wait that long)
  
• grease a large deep pie dish (roughly 20-25cm). Trim the pastry to fit the pie dish. Spoon the chicken mixture into the pie dish and brush the edge of the pastry with egg. Lay another piece of pastry over the top and press the edges firmly together.
• Trim the pastry and make a couple of small cuts in the top for the steam to escape. Let the kids brush the top of the pie with more egg and decorate with pastry shapes if their leetle hearts so desire.
• Place in oven for about 30 mins, or until thet pastry is golden brown and the filling cooked through. If the pie is to be given away, cook until pastry is lightly browned so that pie can be re-heated in an oven without burning the pastry.
• Serve with mashed potato, carrots, beans etc. (serves 6)
  

This recipe comes from the Kamaroi 2009 cookbook, Recipes with Heart and Soul, and really is the bees' bloody knees of chicken pies.

Things got quite hectic in my kitchen...

And here's what the boykies were doing while I was cooking up a storm...

A tad ambitious for a monday night's dinner when I commenced cooking at 5pm?? Perhaps. Let's just say I'm not always as sensible as I look. (!) It was really delicious though.