Next Day Pheasant Pie

Yesterday's Slow Cooked Pheasant recipe yielded massive dinners for Mr Umami and myself and hearty lunches for us both the following day. Making bigger dinners and then taking leftovers to work is my top tip to save hassle in the morning or anxiety over finding anything suitable for an allergy diet in the perimeter of the workplace. I like to pack the leftovers up the night before to give myself one less thing to try and squeeze in the morning. 

Pies are versatile: use whatever leftover meat you have to hand, add some vegetable fillers (carrot, swedes, parsnip, celery, leeks, etc), and some 'meaty' fillers: mushrooms, chestnuts, beans, fried bacon or other bits of leftover meats, or even potato if the cuboard is bare. Optional: an 'accent' such as: prunes, figs, apple, currants, apricot.

Then top with pastry. 

Tips for Working with Gluten Free Pastry

This will need to be chilled for a minimum of thirty minutes. If in doubt, make it a little dryer than you think you'll need and it'll be easier to work with. If your kitchen is on the warm side (like my closet sized one is) consider taking the pastry and a smooth chopping board lined with clingfilm into the living room (or any other cool room) to roll it out. Warm pastry will tear a lot. 

And if it tears, just patch it up! It's home-made, after all.

I don't line my pies with an underlayer of pastry as it seems a lavish use of expensive flour and dairy free butter substitute - and just because I'm gluten free doesn't mean I don't still need to watch my cholesterol - but if you'd like to do so, please double up the amount of pastry dough below.

Gluten Free Pastry:

• 190 g gluten free flour (I use Doves Gluten Free White Bread Flour with Xantham gum already added)
• 90 g dairy free spread (I use Pure Dairy Free Sunflower spread)
• 1 egg, whisked
• 1 tablespoon of water.
• clingfilm

If using a bowl and spoon, chop butter up into cubes, and rub into the dough until it resembles breadcrumbs, then add the whisked egg and mix with a spoon until it just begins to come together. Tip out of the bowl onto a smooth surface and roll into a smooth ball and wrap in clingfilm, then leave in fridge to harden.

If using a food processor: add flour and butter and pulse a few times until the mix achieves that breadcrumb texture. Add the egg and blend for a few seconds. My thermomix found the mixture too hard for the blades to keep whirring after a few secs, and it has a strong motor, so I wouldn't push it on a lesser powered food processor. Just blend for a few seconds and then stop, tip out into a bowl and form into a ball by hand, cover in clingfilm and then leave to harden.

For the Pie filling:

• Leftover pheasant meat, stripped from carcass.
• 1 Large carrot, diced
• 1 Parsnip, diced
• 1 baking apple
• 1 leek
• olive oil
• 100ml of chicken stock
• thyme
• 1 egg (whisked), for brushing on the pastry.

Method:
Fry up the leeks on a gentle heat - the idea is to caramalise them a little rather than kill them- and then add the carrots and parsnips to soften a little. Tip all into the pie dish.

Take the pastry ball out from the fridge. I have a silicone mat that I like to roll out my pastry on as it's non-stick, but you can use a sheet of clingfilm under and over the pastry ball. I find gluten free pastry tears more easily than regular type pastry so once I have it rolled out to the shape I like I pick up my silicone sheet, flip it over onto the pie dish and carefully separate it from the silicone sheet with a dining knife. 

Press the pastry over the sides of the baking dish, then brush with whisked egg and bake in a pre heated oven at 200C for half an hour until the pastry is puffed up and golden.