My, oh my! What a pot pie!

Mrs. Poolman and I share separate, but similar bad childhood memories of pot pies. Both our mothers cooked (if you can call it that) and served the pre-made Banquet or Swanson pies. My recollection is of an aluminum foil mini-pie pan with only a top-crust and filled with nasty, oozing, yellow gravy, a few peas and carrots and maybe a little meat. The pot pies made those old-style TV dinners look like gourmet feasts. That experience left me with a deep seated aversion to pot pies – until recently.

In an effort to convert me, last winter, Mrs. P made a very good chicken pot pie. She constructed and baked it in a casserole-size baking dish. The filling was full of meat and the whole thing tasted great.

On Wednesday, it was my turn to make dinner, using some left-over grilled steak from earlier in the week. Usually, we will put the steak on a salad or make quesadillas or fajitas. I thought I would try something new.

How about a steak pie?

This was brand, new culinary territory for me. So you can imagine my excitement when it turned out really good. Here is what I did.

Steak Pie

What I used.

• App. 1 lb (0r more) of cooked steak, sliced into small pieces.
• One package of pre-made pie dough (2 pieces, top and bottom)
• One onion – chopped
• ½ stick butter or margarine
• One “scoop” of flour
• 2 cups of beef broth (bouillon crystals or cubes dissolved in hot water)
• ½ cup of milk (because that was all that was in the carton) The milk is optional.
• One small can of mushroom stems and pieces
• App. one cup of leftover green beans (because I had them.)

 The Crust

In a small, ungreased casserole (8×8” or 7×9”) dish, spread one of the pie dough pieces, lining the bottom and sides. The pie dough is probably fitted for a round pie pan, so you’ll have to cut and patch to make it fit. Save the second piece for the top.

The Filling

In a large sauce pan, saute the chopped onion in the butter until the onion is soft.

Add the “scoop” (approximately two tablespoons) of flour to the onion-butter mixture. Mix well and allow it to cook for about a minute or two.

Add the beef broth/bouillon and milk and stir until it is a smooth gravy. Add the bouillon a little at a time, and adjust the amount according to the thickness of the gravy. You want it fairly thick.

The filling -- before adding the meat.

Add the meat and vegetables and mix well.

This is how much meat I had to work with.

Pour the mixture into the dough-lined casserole dish.

Before the top crust was added.

Spread the second dough piece over the top, once again, cutting and patching to completely cover the pie. Try to get the bottom and top pieces to meet and use a fork to crimp them together along the edge of the dish.

Ready for the oven.

Use a knife to put a couple of cross-shaped slits in the top crust to allow steam to escape during the baking. You may have to check on those “vents” during the baking. As the crust bakes, the holes may close up.

Bake at 375 degrees for approximately 45 minutes, or until the crust is golden brown.

...and ready to eat.

Note: I used green beans last night, because that is what I had in the refrigerator. You can add whatever vegetables you like, or skip the veggies all together.

Bon appetite!

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Left overs — Food, that is.

We eat pretty well around Casa Poolman and always have. (I’ve picked up around 10 pounds since Christmas to show for it.) Both Mrs. Poolman and I cook. She is a much better cook than I, but I hold my own and she doesn’t complain.

One thing we both try to do is to get the maximum mileage out of what we cook. If we cook one big meal, it almost always stretches to another left-over dinner and maybe a lunch or two.

We are not as frugal as one of Mrs. P’s sisters, who will scrape the last six grains of rice from the bottom of a pot to save for a future meal.

I was thinking of this when I was eating lunch today. It was the end of a two-meal combo that demonstrated some food efficiency.

–Last Saturday, I grilled two rib-eye steaks and had some leftovers.

–On Sunday, I barbecued a whole chicken. Roughly one and a half breasts were left over.

–On Tuesday, I saute’d some sliced onion and red pepper with the sliced leftover steak and chicken and some fajita seasoning. We served it on flour tortillas with some refried beans and had great fajitas. Muy bueno!

–There was still left over fajita meat and vegetables. Mrs. P and I both took fajita salads to work for lunch on Wednesday.

Good lunch!

–And there was just enough left for another fajita salad for my lunch today.

All told, it was a pretty good use of leftovers. And good too!