Bacon Gratin Pie...

Sometimes you need to branch out at dinner time and try something different. In this case, dream up something different. It was far from perfect and needs some development to make it really work but a general success and pretty tasty. Anyway, it's something you can work with as an idea. It's just a puff pastry sheet with a tasty filling topped with sliced potato and cheese. In this one I fried up onions, garlic, leeks and smoked bacon to make a filling, topped it with sliced boiled potatoes and cheese and carefully poured over a little beaten egg and milk mixture then baked it for about 30 minutes at 200°C.

The result is something of a cross between a pie, a gratin and a fritata. A welcome break from the norm.

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Chicken & Leek Pasties...

I was looking for something different to make for lunch and came across a Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall recipe for these pasties. I didn't follow the recipe as such, but went along with the idea of it and was pleased with the results.

Pastry:
• Blend the flour and butter until they resemble breadcrumbs and bind together with cold water to form a dough.
• Roll the dough out to 5mm thick, fold back into a square, re-roll and repeat for or 5 times. This gives you a slightly flaky pastry.
• Chill the dough for an hour or so and meanwhile make the filling.

Filling:
• Chop the leek and onion and fry gently in some oil.
• Meanwhile, trim and chop the chicken into fairly small pieces that will cook relatively qucikly (1cm cubes); add to the frying pan and cook until beginning to brown.
• Whilst this is going on dice the potatoes and boil separately, until quite soft.
• When both are ready combine in the pan and mix together quite roughly to break up the potatoes and combine all the flavours. Season with salt & pepper.
• Set aside to cool.

Assembly:
• Rollout the pastry to 3-4mm thick and cut out 20-22cm diameter rounds
• Place a heap of the filling on one half of each. Brush some milk or egg around the edge of the circle then fold over and crimp together with your fingers.
• Place on a baking tray, brush with beaten egg and cook at 190°C for 20-25 minutes until golden brown.

Notes:
• Add some chopped smoked bacon to improve flavours.

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