November 2013
Thanksgiving and turkey are so synonymous, but for our Harvest & Gather Thanksgiving dinner, my partner and I wanted to serve the traditional bird in a nontraditional way… a la mini pot pies.
I never focus on precision when it comes to making pot pie filling. Once the pie crust is in place, I mound ingredients by sight and taste, so the “recipe” below should be taken with an [approximate] grain of salt. When making these for a dinner occasion, it’s helpful to make extra filling to serve to your gluten-free guests (sauté all the ingredients together to serve). I also recommend making a few vegetarian pies with a different scored design to distinguish them from their meaty counterparts.
Tangy & Flaky Whole-Wheat Pie Crust
Ingredients
2 cups Whole Wheat Pastry Flour
1 teaspoon Sea Salt
3/4 cup organic, unsalted butter, chilled
5-8 Tablespoons Apple Cider Vinegar, chilled
Directions
Sift flour and salt into a large mixing bowl.
Cut butter into 12 pieces and rub into dry ingredients until the mixture resembles a coarse meal with some pea-size pieces.
Sprinkle apple cider vinegar over mixture, one Tablespoon at a time and knead lightly just until dough forms.
Form dough into a ball. Cut in half and press each into a disc shape. Wrap each disc in waxed paper or plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes before rolling.
Makes two 9-inch pie crusts (16 slices).
Bake crust following your pie’s instructions or pre-bake at 375°F for 25 – 30 minutes.
Individual Turkey Pot Pies
Ingredients
1 lb butternut squash, cubed, roasted w/ olive oil, salt, pepper & herbs
2 shallots, sliced, roasted w/ the butternut squash
1 lb turkey breast cutlets, seared in local bacon fat & cut into chunks
pre-sliced & pre-cooked chestnuts (available at Trader Joe’s)
fresh sage, to taste
fresh thyme, to taste
organic kale, choppedshredded organic gruyere cheese
Directions
Roll out the pie dough and cut into pieces small enough to press into the individual sections of a cupcake pan (I used a larger sized cupcake pan).
Remove the cupcake pan from the freezer. Add the ingredients to each pie crust. The ingredients can form a mound higher than the pan height.
Use remaining pie dough to form the tops of each pie. Chill in the freezer while preheating the oven.
Preheat oven to 425 F.
Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, or until pastry is golden brown and filling is bubbly.
Cool for 10 minutes before serving.
Bon Appétit!
-Quelcy
ps: All photos in this post were taken by my talented friend Chris Goodman.
