Comfort food for a battered ego...

I have to admit the macaroon episode dented my confidence so this weekend I felt the need to return to something closer to my comfort zone: pie!  A couple of weeks ago I watched Jamie Oliver make a steak, Guinness and cheese pie on the TV and I had to have a go.  A friend coming round for relaxed Saturday night dinner was the perfect excuse to not only make the pie but to convince the husband to take a trip to the butcher's to buy some steak instead of relying on the supermarket.  I have to take a moment here to praise our local butcher, Crown Butcher's in Stourbridge. The quality and service is fantastic and you do definitely get what you pay for.  It's not every month we can afford to go, and frankly sometimes the supermarket is just far too convenient, but when we do it really is worth it.

I decided not to follow Jamie's recipe but sort of make my own up following similar principles and it was truly wonderful.  So wonderful in fact that we didn't wait to photograph it so you could see it but just dived straight in!  You will have to take my word for it looking nearly as good as it tasted!

I used:

About half a kilo good quality braising steak diced

One carrot, diced fairly small

Roughly 100g mushroom, quartered

One bottle Guinness

150g strong cheddar cheese, grated.

Fresh thyme

Salt and pepper

500g ready made block of puff pastry

I first of all put the carrots into a  frying pan and fried in a little olive oil until softened.  If you had a heavy bottomed casserole dish you could just use this and save yourself washing up an extra piece of equipment but mine's heavy and not easy to manoeuvre so I use a frying pan and transfer.  When soft, add the mushrooms and fry until they colour.  Transfer both of these into the casserole dish.

Add a little more oil to the pan and add the steak, browning all over.  You may need to do this in batches if the pan isn't big enough.  When brown add 1 heaped tablespoon of flour and mix in to coat the meat, this will help thicken the gravy.

Add to the casserole dish and pour over the Guinness.  Top up a little bit with water if needed which will depend on the size and width of your casserole dish.

Add some chopped fresh thyme and salt and pepper and put in a 100-120 degree oven for 1½ hours.  

After this time the liquid should have reduced slightly.  If not, spoon some off as you want a thick sauce for the pie.  If it is too wet then the pastry will never cook through.  You can always reduce this extra liquid on the hob and use as a gravy to serve with the pie so it won't go to waste (this is what I did anyway!).

Cook for another hour in the oven and if it is still a bit wet then put the casserole dish on the hob and reduce the liquid down  then allow to cool for a couple of minutes.

Turn the oven up to 200 degrees to preheat.

Cut two thirds of the pastry off the block and roll out on a floured surface to be the base of your pie.  Grease the pie dish and allow the pastry to fall into the bottom of the dish rather than forcing it and let the overlap hang over the edge.  

Add the cheese to the filling, stir through and pour on top of the pie base.

Roll out the remaining one third of pastry to be the lid.  If you have eggs in the house (which I didn't), the best way to do it would be to trim the base slightly, egg wash around the rim and then put the pie lid on top, crimpt together with your fingers and egg wash the whole thing to keep it stuck together and make it golden on top when cooked.  As I had no egg I put the lid on top and folded the edges all the way around like a cornish pasty to keep it all together.  Some of the pastry didn't quite cook but it didn't bother us!

Put two holes in the pie to allow steam to escape and put in the oven for 30-40 minutes.

We had this with mashed potato, peas and extra Guinness gravy that I took from the filling and there was not a scrap left.  This should probably be enough for four normal people or three greedy people like us!