Craving #3: Chicken Pot Pie

[by js]

Craving #3: Chicken Pot Pie

I'm infinitely suggestible, so when I saw the steak pie on Jamie Oliver's episode on pastries several weeks ago, I knew I wanted a similar feast.

(For those keeping count, Craving #1 was Baked Manicotti, Craving #2 was the Burger.)



It's been quite a long time since I've had chicken pot pie. The last one I had was probably -- oh, losing count here -- more than ten years ago and in one of those microwaveable frozen incarnations. Most probably what they sell as an "Aussie Pie."

I had no idea how to make Chicken Pot Pie though and this is a dish that is not in our repertoire. I've seen TV chefs make them, and from my own previous experiences of the dish, I can approximate what goes into the pie.

Seems like a very "standard" tasting-dish to me: that is, something with a mirepoix of celery, onions, and carrots, seasoned with thyme, in a white-ish, thick-ish pool, most likely cream. Chicken-y tasting of course.

Whatever made me decide today was the day to make a pot of chicken pie.

I made the executive decision at about 4 o'clock in the afternoon today and had about 2 hours to cook. I had decided not to use a whole chicken, because I did not want to go through the hassle of poaching the chicken and shredding it for the pot pie. I went with boneless, skinless thighs instead.

And -- CHICKEN BROTH! I've been having my own dilemmas -- infinitely uninteresting to everybody else but myself of course -- vis a vis chicken broth, but since laziness took over today, I've decided to cave and just be a user. Oh well, I figure this is going to be a dry run for my "real" chicken pot pie.

We tried to find puff pastry in the supermarket, as all these TV chefs claim that all supermarkets have them, but Safeway and Choices did not have puff pastry. The compromise is phyllo pastry and here's the result.









[Thanks to LSC for putting on the phyllo top and making it pretty!]

Overall, not bad. I was happy with the result, but if I were to make it again, I will tweak the recipe a little bit to make the dish a little bit richer.