mulberryshoots

Earlier this week we had roast cornish hen with stuffing. Because we prefer dark meat, I saved the breast meat to make a chicken pot pie this weekend. So, this morning, I heated up a skillet and melted some unsalted butter, chopped and sauteed some onion, celery hearts with leaves, carrot and potato. Simmered the vegetables in stock while I deboned the cornish hen meat and cut it into pieces.

To the aromatic vegetables, I added the chicken, diced potatoes,  chicken broth and put on the lid. After twenty minutes, I made a roux of butter, flour and milk in another pan and gently folded it into the stew mix, and let it bubble for another twenty minutes. I then let it cool.

Near dinnertime, I folded in a cup of peas from the freezer (because they sometimes get overcooked and hard); spread the chicken pot pie mixture into an oval white porcelain baking dish (buttered,) and rolled out a puff pastry piece to fit the oval shape. I then cut a design into the pastry and crimped the edges inside the edge of the dish, covering the edges with aluminum foil so they wouldn’t burn.

I preheated the oven to 400 degrees and put the pie in to cook; after 20 minutes, it was bubbling but the crust looked flat and raw on top of the casserole. So, I increased the oven heat to 425 degrees, took the aluminum foil off and baked the pie for another fifteen minutes. When I peeked at it, it had puffed up and was a golden, bubbly brown. SO BEAUTIFUL!! I turned the heat down to 200 degrees to keep it risen and bubbly until right before serving. Meanwhile, I put together a salad of romaine, fresh navel orange segments, avocado and maple glazed walnuts that I dressed with vinaigrette.

We invited our downstairs neighbor to join us for supper – and cleaned up the entire chicken pot pie in what seemed like just a few minutes. It worked out so well that I might try this with a beef and mushroom shepherd’s pie filling with the pie crust on top instead of mashed potatoes. It was as scrumptious tasting as it looked!

Not too bad for leftovers!