Hope you all had a great time sending out the noughties and bringing in the new decade. I spent the day roasting on the beach with my dear friend Alana... we thought we didn't get burnt as we put on lots of sunscreen on throughout the day... but it was not the case. We are slightly lobsterish.
I spent the night at a cocktail dinner party at another lovely friend's house, with some of my favorite people. I will be blogging about the amazing food from that soon.
The thing that drew me to this recipe was the use of wholegrain mustard. It was a very welcome condiment to be added in the pie mixture. Full of flavour, and a very good sized pie to feed 6 people. Another ingredient that was included that usually isn't in a chicken and leek pie was celery. Everything worked excellently together, and I would definitely make it again.
2 cups (500ml) chicken stock
600g chicken breast fillets
1 tablespoon olive oil
40g butter
1 large leek (500g), sliced thinly
2 stalks celery (300g), trimmed, chopped finely
2 tablespoons plain flour
2 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves
1/2 cup (125ml) milk
1 cup (250ml) cream
2 teaspoons wholegrain mustard
2 sheets shortcrust pastry
1 sheet puff pastry
1 egg yolk
1. Bring stock to the boil in medium saucepan. Add chicken; return to the boil. Reduce heat; simmer, covered about 10 minutes or until chicken is cooked. Remove from the heat; stand chicken in poaching liquid 10 minutes. Remove chickenl chop coarsley. Reserve 1/3 cup of the poaching liquid; keep remainder for another use or discard.
2. Heat oil and butter in medium saucepan; cook leek and celery, stirring, until leek softenes. Add flour and thyme; cook, stirring, 1 minute. Gradually stir in reserved poaching liquid, milk and cream; cook, stirring, until mixture boils and thickens. Stir in chicken and mustard. Cool 10 minutes.
4. Line base and side of dish with shortcrust pastry, trim to fit; prick well all over with fork. Bake 10 minutes. Cool 5 minutes. Spoon chicken mixture into pastry case; place puff pastry over filling, trim to fit dish. Brush pastry with egg yolk; cut two small slits in top of pastry. bake 20 minutes or until browned lightly.
Serves 6.
This looks so good, I am sure that the wholegrain mustard does indeed make all the difference.
Oh, pacman references will never get old :)
Happy new year! I can feel a good one coming on!