Puff Pastry Beef Pie (also my stew).

[Richard]

Beef Pie (from the meeting):

I do this all by eye so it's a little hard to write down. I am most certainly not a scientist when it comes to cookery

Here goes:

The following chopped into ~1cm^3-ish chunks:
1 turnip
five potatoes (medium sized)
five carrots (medium sized)
three-four sticks of celery.
two large onions

The following chopped coarsely:
two fistfuls of baby spinach
a handful of chives (FRESH)
a teaspoon of fresh thyme (take it off the twigs)

chopped finely:
half a bulb of garlic.

The following chopped into 2cmx1cm^2 chunks:
Two lbs "eye of round" beef cut.

Olive oil, pepper, beef stock (pre-salted, otherwise use salt) about 2-4 cups to taste depending on meat quality, good (thick) soy sauce.

pan-fry turnip with pepper using olive oil sparingly until slightly browned. Ditto carrots. Ditto celery. Dump into large-ish (a gallon or two) pot. Boil potatoes 5 minutes. Discard water + pan-fry potatoes without pepper, until crisp on outside. Throw in same big pot as before. Fry onions until slightly browned, throw in a slug of soy sauce, fry 30 seconds more and throw in big pot. Fry beef mega-high heat until Maillard has his way with it, dump into same pan. Throw two cups of stock + enough water to cover all stuff in pan, not much more. Bring to boil. Throw half of the chives + thyme + garlic in now, and the other half in the last few minutes of cooking. Cook for 30-minutes to an hour, using bits of turnip as a guide to "done-ness". Once the turnip is soft (but not anywhere near pulp), it's done. Cover whilst still hot.

Leave overnight to cool. USE A FRIDGE.

leave 4 sheets of puff pastry (I use PC) out to thaw overnight (I forgot this once).

dump a few ladles -- about enough to cover 1/3 surface area in the middle of each sheet (keep them on the parchment paper they come in). fold edges in and join seam roughly. Cook for about 45 mins to an hour (until golden) at 375 celcius.

eat.

[Dave Savoie]

I must say was very very good !!!!

[Richard]

Making this again today... if my math is right I'm going to have one metric shitload too many.

Wife is out of town... guess I'll be eating pie + stew for the rest of the weekend

[Dave Savoie]

its that good it shouldnt be a problem !!!

[Richard]

Apparently this would sell at a restaurant... the greatest praise I've received for my cooking. I'm feeling good about this one

[brew]

Twas most excellent - thanks for the doggie bag!

[Dean]

where's the stout go if one is so inclined, in place of the beef stock?

[Richard]

Aye that's what I did yesterday - used 500ml of stout in place of 2 cups of stock.