Timmy's Pies

Wild garlic and spring lamb Shepherd’s Pie.

The other week we were asked to develop a shepherd’s pie - not just any shepherd’s pie, but “the greatest shepherd’s pie EVER”. So no pressure then.

So we put on our pastry hats (we do actually have pastry hats) and had a good think. This was when we thought of wild garlic – we’d seen hordes of it packing out the verges of the lanes in Cornwall, it’s got a fantastically sweet, subtle garlic flavour that would go beautifully with spring lamb.

Wild garlic. Grrrrrr.

So here’s our recipe for wild garlic shepherd’s pie. This one comes in 3 parts: the meat, the sauce and veg., and the mash. We made ours with a shortcrust pastry base and a fluffy mash piped on top, which makes them great as individual portions. Feel free to leave out the shortcrust and make as a sharer in a ceramic dish. Makes enough for 8 lunch-sized pies (or for 4 to share).

Ben "Lightning" Christopherson, rolling the lamb in wild garlic leaves.

Ingredients:

500g lamb shoulder or neck

bunch of wild garlic, keep 10  leaves whole, finely chop the rest

bunch of rosemary, finely chopped

bunch of parsley, finely chopped

100g peas (of course)

100g diced carrot (into little cubes)

100g diced onion

500ml really good lamb stock (if you’ve got time, make yer own)

500ml white wine

1 tblspn tomato puree

400g Red Desiree or King Edward potatoes

50ml milk

50ml cream

100g butter + a knob for frying

1 egg yolk

sprinkle of nutmeg

salt to taste

600g shortcrust pastry

 

1. Slow roast the lamb. Preheat the oven to 140. Season the meat with a hefty pinch of salt, wrap in wild garlic leaves and place in a roasting dish. Roast for 4 hours until it’s falling apart. Let it cool and then shred it into chunks.
2. Put a deep frying pan on the hob and get it nice and hot. Drop in a lug of sunflower oil and knob of butter, and then fry off the diced onion until it starts to go golden.
3. Stir in the tomato puree, the diced carrot and the chopped rosemary. Fry for another 3-4 mins then add the white wine. Let this reduce by about a third before adding the lamb stock. Cook until the carrots are tender, and remove from the heat.
4. At this stage, add the peas, parsley and wild garlic and season to taste. Add the shredded lamb and allow to cool – this is your shepherd’s pie filling. It should have quite a bit of liquid, but shouldn’t be swimming. You can always adjust by either adding more wine or lamb stock, or by straining off some of the liquid and reducing in a pan.
5. The mash. Get a pot of salted water to boiling point on the hob. Peel and chop the potatoes into 2cm chunks and boil in the salted water until tender throughout At the same time, warm the milk and the cream in a pan with a sprinkle of nutmeg. Strain the potatoes until completely dry and pop back in the pot, along with the butter, the egg yolk and the cream/milk/nutmeg. Do the mashed potato. The egg yolk will stabilize the mash when it bakes.
6. If you’re making individual pies, roll out the pastry to line your pie cases. About 4mm thickness will do, and leave a lip standing proud of the case. Fill 2/3 with the lamb mix, and top with mash – it looks great if you can get hold of a piping bag with a star nozzle, if not – spoon away.
7. Bake at 180 for 40 mins if using pastry, 30 mins if not. Serve piping hot and in a hedgerow.

The finished product - individual shepherd's pies (with shortcrust pastry base)

Welsh Tapas Pie: The making of…

So we painted ourselves into a bit of a corner with our foolish pie fillings competition, but we’re pie-men of our word. And thus we found ourselves making a pie from pickled eggs, pickled onions and a retro crisp selection; the principal components of Welsh Tapas (thank you, Jo Cresswell). Makes enough for 3 lunch-sized pies (although why anyone would want to make more than 1…)

15p for Space Raiders? We remember when they were 6p...

Ingredients:

3 pickled eggs

3 large pickled onions

2 packets pickled onion flavour “Space Raiders” crisps

1 packet smokey bacon flavour “Pom Bear” crisps

2 eggs

100ml milk

50ml single cream

Handful of chopped parsley

Pinch of salt and pepper

300g shortcrust pastry

1. Make a quiche-type base by beating together the eggs, milk and cream. Add the parsley, salt and pepper. Dice up the pickled onions and crush up the Pom Bears and fold this in.
2. Line a 3½ “ pie tin with sortcrust pastry. Carefully place a whole pickled egg in the center. Fill around this with the egg, onion mix. Crumble the space raiders on top and lid with pastry.
3. Decorate, glaze with egg or milk and bake at 180 for 40 mins, or until the pastry is golden.
4. Allow to cool, take a day trip to Newport and enjoy.

A fantastic pickled egg cross-section.

Now that's a happy winner.

And for the runner up: a voucher for 4 pies, redeemable at the Timmy's Pies Saturday market stall. We actually baked the voucher, but it was too fragile to send to Holland so we took a picture, printed it out and laminated it instead. We ate the actual pastry voucher. It tasted good.

A Winter Stewp

We were given the most glorious January King cabbage after the market the other week. It was deep purple-green and about the size of a mountain lion. We loved that cabbage. We decided that if we were going to cook it, and not just admire it until it went mouldy, we had to do it justice.

We went for a stewp – half way between and stew and a soup – of ham hock, cider, green lentils and, of course, cabbage. Here’s the recipe – we know it’s not a pie, but this is a cracking stewp, and what with the snow outside and cabbages in season, the timing’s spot on.

Loadsa snow in Hyde Park

Serves 4

Ingredients:

1.5kg ham hock, smoked or un-smoked depending on preference

2 onions, one quartered, one diced

4 sticks of celery

3 bay leaves

½ bunch parsley

½ bunch thyme

a handful of peppercorns

1 pint cider

5 cloves garlic

1 knob of butter

lug of olive oil

200g green lentils

1 fancy cabbage

 

1. In a pot, cover the ham hock in cold water, bring to the boil and simmer for 3 mins. Discard the water and wash the ham – otherwise your stewp will be too salty.

 

2. Pour in the cider and top up with cold water to cover. Add the bay leaves, peppercorns, two sticks of celery and the quartered onion. Take just the stalks off the parsley, bash the thyme sprigs with the blunt edge of a knife and add both to the pot. Bring back to the boil, then simmer for 2 hours, or until the ham falls off the bone.

 

3. Meanwhile dice the second onion, the garlic, and the rest of the celery, then shred the cabbage. When the ham is done, pop it on a chopping board. Pass the liquor through a sieve into a jug and keep to one side.

 

4. Rinse out the pot, get it back on a high heat and fry up the onion in the butter and olive oil. When soft but not brown, add the garlic and celery for a further 3 mins.

 

5. Add about 2 pints of liquor and the lentils. Chop up the  parsley leaves and add them too. Bring to the boil and simmer for 35 mins. While this is going, pull the pork off the bone and add it as and when. After 35 mins, pop in the cabbage and cook for a further 10 mins, topping up with liquor if required.

6. Eat between snowball fights. Or after a really cold day at the market.

More warming than wearing every item of clothing you own.

Royal pork, veal & pigeon breast pie with a cider jelly

The double-whammy of some quality nationalist fervour and a bank holiday weekend managed to entice me out of the pie-cave last weekend, so I jumped in the pie-mobile and hot-footed it down to Dorset (stopping for a cornetto at Fleet services, wouldn’t be a bank holiday without a cornetto from Fleet services).

I managed to shoe-horn so much fun into 4 days that by Monday evening I was as wide-eyed and jittery as an ADD kid that had to eat himself out of a candy-floss avalanche. To kick the weekend off, I went with my folks to their street party in Poole.

Ridiculous hat, nice ale... has to be a bank holiday

 

I created this pie for the street party, and it went down a storm – so expect to see it on the market stall any day soon. It’s pork, veal and pigeon breast with cider jelly – it’s a bit more complex than some of the other recipes and you need to make both jelly and your own hot water crust pastry for this one. But stick with it and you’ll have a pie to be truly proud of at the other end. Perfect for a pic-nic date with Pippa Middleton. Makes 2 loaf-sized pies

 

Ingredients:

 

For the jelly:

500g pork bones or trotters (tell your butcher it’s for making jelly)

12 peppercorns

pinch of salt

3 bay leaves

2 leaves of gelatine

If you have any to use up –some celery, carrot and/or onion

1 liter dry cider

1 tsp sugar

1 tsp salt

 

For the pastry:

600g flour

250g lard

120 ml water

120 ml milk

1 tsp salt

2 tsp icing sugar

1 egg and a splash of milk to wash

 

For the filling:

450g minced pork shoulder

450g minced veal

200g smoked bacon rashers (thin sliced)

300g pigeon breast

2 onions

4 cloves garlic

1 tsp each white pepper & cinnamon

2 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp anchovy essence (optional)

a fistful each of sage, parsley and thyme

 

1. Put the pork bones in 2 pints of water with the salt, pepper corns & bay leaves, throw in whole any celery, onion or carrot you have going spare. Bring to the boil and leave to bubble away for 2 hours with a lid on.

 

2. Finely chop the onion, the garlic and all the herbs. Pop these in a mixing bowl with the minced pork and veal, plus the white pepper, cinnamon, ginger and anchovy essence.

 

3. Par-boil the pigeon breast. Pop then in the pot you’re making the jelly in and fish them out after 15 minutes – when they’re mostly cooked through but a tad pink in the middle. Dice into 1/2cm cubes and add to the mixing bowl.

 

4. Get in there. Mix all the ingredients together thoroughly with your hands, cover with cling film and stick it in the fridge until you’re ready to use it again.

 

5. Make a start on the pastry. Bring the water, milk and lard to the boil in a pan. Pour onto the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl and make into a dough. Wrap this in cling film and chill in the fridge (the pastry, not yourself).

 

6. Reduce the cider for the jelly. Get a deep frying pan or pot really hot on the hob, then pour in the cider in one quick movement – stand back cos it will spit and fizzle but keep pouring the cider in so you don’t burn it. As it reduces add the salt and sugar, and keep heating it until you’ve only got about 200ml left. Set aside.

 

7. When the liquid stock around the pork bones has reduced by about a half, strain it though a fine sieve and discard the solid part. If there’s more than a pint there, reduce this still further.

 

8. Soak the gelatine sheets in cold water for 10 minutes, wring them out and add them to the jelly stock and the reduced cider. This extra gelatine will just make sure that your jelly sets properly. If the stock is not warm enough to dissolve the gelatine sheets then warm it gently on the hob. Set the jelly aside for later.

 

9. Put the oven on at 180 Celsius

 

10. You’re now ready to assemble the pie. Get your pastry out of the fridge and let it come to room temperature. Roll out the pastry to your desired thickness and line a non-stick loaf tin. If you’re using an older loaf tin, you might want to grease it with butter to make it easier to get your pie out at the end.

 

11. Line the pastry with a layer of bacon rashers. Pack in the pork/veal/pigeon mix and press it down. Roll out a lid for your pie, cut two 5p sized holes in it and seal it over the filling by pinching the edges together.

 

12. Use any remaining pastry to make decorative patterns – leaves are traditional but you can go with anything you fancy. Stick these on with beaten egg/milk wash and then glaze the whole lid with the same mixture.

 

13. Place in the middle of the oven for 30 minutes at 180, then turn down to 160 for a further hour.

 

14. When cooked, leave to cool for 40 minutes, then add the jelly. Warm the jelly if it has set, and pour as much as you can through the 5p sized holes in the lid – I find a funnel helps with this bit. Finally brush any remaining jelly over the lid of the pie to give it that lovely glistening look and leave it in the fridge over night to let the jelly set.

 

15. Remove the pie from the loaf tin, slice and enjoy (with a well-earned sense of accomplishment, and some pickle). 

The lovely Hollie, flying the 'over-excited-purchase' flag.

 

Hare Here Hare (hare ragu and mushroom pie)

Hare pie – a properly gamey pie, not to be confused with hair pie or the German for Mr. Pie. Not a quick one this one, but it’s worth the effort. Hare’s in season right now, but not for much longer, so get your skates on! This recipe will make a good kilo and a half of ragu, so use as much as you like as a pie filling and freeze the rest for an emergency (although not so useful when faced with a proper emergency, like a house fire or a heart attack). 

Ingredients:

1 hare, jointed

1 bottle red wine

600g diced carrots

600g diced onion

2 bunches diced celery

300g diced leeks

2 big cloves garlic

300g mushrooms

2 tablespoons tomato puree

Spice bag:

half a star anise,

6 juniper berries,

half cinnamon stick

6 peppercorns

3 sprigs thyme

3 sprigs rosemary

short crust pastry

egg and milk to glaze.

1. Tie up all the spices for your spice bag in a piece of muslin. I go with a nice granny knot (my Scout master would spin in his grave!).

2. Dice up the carrot, celery, onion, leek and garlic. Marinate along with the hare and spice bag in the red wine for as long as possible (overnight, preferably).

3. Take the hare out of the marinade and brown in a heavy-bottomed pan, with a good lug of olive oil. Set to one side.

4. Drain the veggies and put them in the pan next – soften with another lug of olive oil for about 15 minutes, until all the liquid has come out of the veg and then reduced back again.

5. Pop the hare back in the pan, along with the wine and the spice bag, and put in the oven at 180 Celsius for 4 ½ hours.

6. While this is cooking, dice up the mushroom (easiest way is to pulse in the blender until finely chopped). Fry up with butter until cooked but not browned.

7. Once the hare has cooked and cooled, you should be able to just pull the meat off the bones with your fingers or with a fork – nice and messy! Pop the meat back in the pan with everything else; add the tomato puree, the mushrooms and another good lug of olive oil. Heat this on the hob until you’ve got a lovely meaty ragu.

8. Line your pie-mold with shortcrust. Fill with hare ragu, put a lid on it, glaze with egg & milk wash and bake for 40 minutes at 200 Celsius.

9. Eat with a spring in your step.

Hullo 2011

I spent the festive period in a satsuma-induced torpor, sitting up to my knees in chocolate Euros wrappers, drinking M&S custard through a straw and watching an unhealthy number of murder mysteries. I saw more of John Nettles than I did of my girlfriend.

This blissfully self-indulgent anti-socialism had to come to an end however, and by New Year I grudgingly accepted that I’d have to dismantle my bacon effigy of Poirot and actually see a real person. So a menu was hatched, my mates were instructed to bring cocktail ingredients, and enough party poppers were bought to put us on a terrorist watch-list.

Slow roast pork with rhubarb sauce:

Score and rub the pork joint with ground salt, pepper and fennel seed. Put in a roasting tin on a bed of veggies – onion, carrot, parsnip and the such. Crank the oven up as high as it will go and pop the joint in. After 30 mins, turn this right down to 170 or so and leave for 3-4 hours. Pop 100ml water: 100g sugar in a pan and bring to a simmer, pop in diced rhubarb and cook this down over a low heat until it thickens into a runny jam sort of consistency (it took mine about 45mins to reach this stage).

I also threw together a slow roast beef shin:

Soften a “soffritto” base (fine diced onion carrot and celery, Tuscan standard) in a casserole with a lug of oil. In go tinned tomatoes, a splash of coffee, garlic and cubed beef shin. Bring to a simmer on the hob then in the oven for 3-4 hours.

Importantly, slow roasting gives you a lot of free time in which to drink. I though you might appreciate my recounting the stand-out cocktail recipe of the evening:

“The Megatron” by J. P. P. Helliwell

• 1 whole lime squeezed and emptied into a large glass.
• Good measure of crushed ice (1/3 of glass).
• A splash of orange juice.
• Half a teaspoon of sugar.
• A large measure of vodka.
• A large measure of White Rum.
• A splash (small) of gin.
• A splash of Blue Curacao
• Fill to the top with Ginger Beer.

Unfortunately we have no photos of the finished cocktail, a drink so awesome  it was gone before snaps could be taken. So here's one of Cointreau, telling elaborate stories to an audience of captivated lime wedges...

Christmas Leftovers Pie

I'm not down with turkey curry; it just doesn't cut it for me and seems like a bit of a sad end for all those delicious leftovers after Christmas lunch. So this year, do something different. Put them in a pie.

Just add a pack of shortcrust pastry, a pack of cranberries and a bit more stuffing mix in your pre-Christmas food shop and you're all set. 

 

This really is enormously simple, and goes a little something like this:

1. Line a cake tin or pie dish with shortcrust pastry. Dice the left over turkey and layer this in the bottom. Throw in any sprouts, pigs in blankets, bread sauce, just leave out the cracker toys.

2. Add a slathering of cranberry sauce and then cover this completely with a layer of stuffing. Sausage meat stuffing is best for this, and make sure it completely covers the other leftovers to stop them drying out when you cook it.

3. Cover the stuffing in a good thick layer of cranberry sauce. Again this seals in the moisture and looks well festive (innit).

4. No need for a lid on this one, put it straight in the oven at 180 for 40 minutes or until the pastry has gone golden.

5. Let it cool. Let it snow. Eat to the sound of sleigh bells. Ding dong merrily on high!

My recipe for cranberry sauce:

300g cranberries

150ml water

100g caster sugar

thick slices of lemon peel

half teaspoon cinnamon

 

Pop the water, sugar, lemon and cinnamon in a pan and bring it to a gentle simmer. Add the cranberries and stir. You want to wait until most of the berries have popped, should be about 15 mins. As the sauce cools it will thicken up into a lovely rich, sweet/sour sauce. Remove the lemon peel at this stage.

 

Merry Christmas everyone!

Northern Pie

I wasn't really expecting much, and I made it more as a joke than an actual nice pie, but blow me down with a feather- steak, bovril and Monster Munch was really very tasty. It's not going to be appearing on the Sloane Square stall any time soon, but I though I'd put the recipe up for a bit o fun (what larks!)

Here's Andy, tucking into his Northern pie, on the transpennine express:

We decided on a few tweaks to the recipe, namely; more bovril, more monster munch. So here's the improved recipe:

Ingredients:

600g stewing beef steak (skirt is good)

2 onions, diced

200g celery, diced

4 carrots or roughly half a butternut squash, diced

Newcastle bron ale

Pickled onion monster munch

Bovril

Small handful of flour

Salt & pepper

Bayleaf

450g shortcrust pastry

1. Dice the stewing steak into small pieces and coat in flour, salf and pepper. Heat a good lug of olive oil in a thick-based pot and brown the beef for 5-10 minutes.

2. Set the browned beef aside and throw a nob of butter in the pot. Add the onions and fry until they begin to brown (10 minutes). Add the carrot and celery, and sweat these alltogether for 2-3 minutes. Then chuck in the ale, bay leaf, beef and 2 tea spoons of Bovril.

3. Let this get up to a simmer, put the lid on and leave it on a low heat for 1 1/2 to 2 hours (top up with water if it starts to dry out).Go for a brisk walk on Ilkley Moor (bar tat).

4. Once it has cooked leave the filling to cool while you prep the pastry. Roll the shortcrust out then crumble monster munch over half of it. Fold the pastry back on itself to sandwich the crisps, then roll out again - making monster munch-infused pastry. Use this to line your pie mould.

5. Most important part... Line the base of the pastry case with whole monster munch crisps and pile the filling on top.

6. Pop a lid on it and glaze with egg. Use any spare pastry to decorate the pie in the image of your favourite Northerner. Use a knife to poke a couple of vent holes in the top and pop it in the oven, 180 for 40 minutes.

7. Allow to cool. Eat within Leeds city limits.

Pot roast pheasant pie

Ahh Winter. The chill morning mists over the rolling hills, the clack of busy pheasants and the pop of shotguns ringing through the clear icey air… is all happening somewhere else because I’m living in London. I did see a flock of parrots in Bishop’s Park the other week and there was a shooting down our road, so it’s really much the same.

However the World’s Greatest Tiny Butchers does have a plentiful supply of pheasant, so I’m happy enough.

Pot-roasting is an awesome method of cooking – one pot, dead easy and the same basic recipe can be modified for many different meals. Try this recipe with wood pigeon or grouse; substitute the white wine for chopped tomatoes and dried chillies for spicy sausage stew; use venison or beef stewing steak with red wine, Madeira, port or dark ale – it’s 9 meals in one. Bargain.

Ingredients:

1 pheasant (usually about 700g)

225g diced carrot

225g sliced celery

300g diced mushrooms

250g diced onion

200g streaky smoked bacon, cut into lardoons

1 bottle white wine  (sauvignon blanc)

3 bay leaves

5-6 sprigs of thyme

50ml double cream

600g shortcrust pastry

 

Top Tip: This recipe is good with a particularly high pheasant (hung 5-7 days), but to reduce potential bitterness, rinse the body cavity with hot water, or even better rinse through with some heated oil and butter before cooking.

1. Heat olive oil in an ovenproof casserole pot. Pop the pheasant in and brown the bird all over. You might want to cover your hand with a tea towel, this spits a bit!

2. Remove the pheasant and set aside. Pop a knob of butter (or more oil) in the pan and add the onion and bacon. Wait until the fluid has come out of the bacon and evaporated so it’s reasonably dry in there.

3. Chuck in the carrot, celery and mushroom, mix it all up and let it fry for 5 mins or so – if it’s getting too dry, add a splash of wine.

4. This isn’t necessary, but to make it easier to remove you might want to tie the bay leaves and thyme into a little bundle using ordinary cotton string. Throw this in along with 500 ml of wine and the pheasant.

5. Lid on and into an oven at 180 for an hour and a half – check it every now and again and add water if it’s getting a bit dry.

6. Remove the pheasant and all the veg with a slotted spoon and set to one side. Throw away the bay/thyme. Put the pot back on the hob and heat the remaining liquid, adding the rest of the wine, the cream, a teaspoon or two of plain flour (just to thicken it up a bit) and salt and pepper to taste. Bubble this away for about 10 mins just to thicken it up and burn off the alcohol.

7. Take the meat off the bird – watch out for the small bones in the leg and any shot! Dice the meat, and mix back in with the veg and the sauce in the pot.

8. Make a pastry base, pack it to the rafters with the filling and pop a lid on.

9. Glaze with egg and bake at 180 for 35 mins.

10. Eat.

Venison, stout and chestnut pie

It’s definitely hat-and-mittens weather now, and we need appropriately wintry recipes. Food-wise this is absolutely the best time of year – venison, pheasant, carrot, squash, chestnut – combinations designed to warm yer cockles.

A proper winter pie this one, it’s also really good as a hearty stew. Best eaten in wellington boots with a sparkler in your hand. I make this with good old Mackeson stout but it’s ace with any brown or dark ale. (Picture pilfered from wildaboutbritain.co.uk)

Ingredients:

300g venison stewing steak, diced

100g butternut squash (peeled and diced)

100g sliced celery

200g diced mushroom

150g diced onion

50g flour

Salt and pepper

1 bay leaf

150g roughly chopped vacuum packed chestnuts (merchant gourmet do good ones)

330ml stout or dark ale

500g shortcrust pastry

 

1. Coat the diced venison in the flour, salt and pepper. Heat some olive oil in an ovenproof casserole pot. Brown the coated venison for 5-10 mins then remove from the casserole.

2. Bung in the onions and add a little more oil. Fry em till they start to brown and then add in the squash, celery and mushroom. Heat these together for 5 mins or so then pour in the stout. Put the venison back in and add the chestnuts and the bay leaf, a pinch more salt and bring to a simmer.

3. Once this is gently simmering, pop it in the oven (lid on) at 180 for an hour and a half.

4. Take it out of the oven and check the flavours – if it’s a bit bitter add a teaspoon or two of muscavado sugar just to take the edge off, and a pinch of salt if you think it needs it.

5. If you want a great stew, serve it at this stage. If you’re making a pie, fish out the venison and about half the chestnuts and veg with a slotted spoon and set to one side. Take the rest, with all the juices, and blitz them in the blender.

6. Make pastry base. Fill half with the venison, chestnut and veg, and half with the blended mix. Pop a lid on, glaze with egg and bake at 180 for 35 mins.

7. Put on wellingtons. Get a sparkler. Eat.