November 16, 2008 | Filed under: VloMo08, good eatin'
So yesterday was really 15 but I called it 14. Today’s video is 15 but really 16. Whatever. I tend not to pay attention to the date when I’m not at work. I also don’t wear a watch on my days off so I never know what time it is. Makes for the illusion that it’s one looooong day off with some sunshiny parts and some nighttimey parts in between.
You’re in for a spate of cooking videos. Why? Because on my days off I cook and I’m housebound. Cooking videos are marginally more interesting than sitting-on-the-couch videos, or sleeping videos.
Savory Hand Pies!
Pastry:
4 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
2 tbs spices of choice
1 cup butter or shortening (I use butter-flavored Crisco)
10-14 tsp icy cold water
Mix flour, salt and spices in a large bowl. I used cumin, coriander and tumeric for this particular chicken sausage meat pie. Cut in the shortening with either a pastry cutter or two butter knives (nice upper arm workout) until the mixture is predominantly pea-sized crumbs. Gradually add the ice water by spoonfuls till the whole mess just comes together. If you pinch it and it holds it’s shape, stop mixing. Form it into one or two balls depending on your counter space (i only have enough room to roll out two smaller ones), saran it and refrigerate it for one hour.
Filling:
This is the fun part. Pick your filling. Some kind of meat/veggie or chicken/veggie or potato/veggie combo cooking in a small amount of liquid (Worchestershire, Soy sauce, Lizano Salsa*, tonkatsu, hoisin, curry, whatever). Doesn’t matter what you use, just cut everything really small and don’t let it be too drippy. Past fillings have included
1. Curried ground pork, Yukon gold potato, onion
2. traditional Jamaican beef patty filling
3. Chicken sausage, Lizano, onion, red pepper, sweet potato
4. Sweet potato, leeks, mushroom
5. Chorizo, potato, chipotles, onion
6. Duck, scallion, hoisin
To Fill:
Roll out the dough to 1/4″. Cut out circles 2-3″ with a floured glass or biscuit cutter. Roll out circles to 5-6 inches 1/8″ thickness if you can manage it. Mine tend to be smaller. Fill w/2 tbs chopped whatnots, crimp, bake at 350F for about 30 minutes or ’till golden. (I like a light egg or milk wash as well…makes the crust all shiny and pretty!)
*INDISPENSABLE STUFF! Savory Costa Rican perfection for all meat pies! Painfully hard to find. I have mine shipped.
November 16, 2008
@ 4:51 pm
This is very cool. Great versatile recipe. Thanks.
November 16, 2008
@ 7:07 pm
Mmmmm food…..very nice…..
November 16, 2008
@ 7:39 pm
MmmMmMmmm.
Tastier then sleeping.
November 16, 2008
@ 11:48 pm
I am coming over for dinner, okay?
November 17, 2008
@ 9:00 am
Set another place for me at the table. I’m coming too!
November 18, 2008
@ 10:54 am
After watching your last four videos, I feel like I should go on a diet.
November 30, 2008
@ 10:52 am
“On my days off…I’m housebound.” Aha! So that’s the catalyst for your gourmet chef recipies, eh?
April 23, 2012
@ 3:21 pm
I have to say that for the past few of hours i have been hooked by the impressive articles on this site. Keep up the wonderful work.