Chicken, Spinach & Tarragon, Filo Pastry Topped Pie
A crisp, golden filo pastry pie with a creamy chicken, spinach and tarragon filling.
Equipment
- 5cm deep by 24cm diameter round oven-proof dish
Ingredients
- 1 TBSP ghee
- 3 shallots
- 1 leek
- 1 stick celery
- 1 clove garlic
- 1 TBSP brown rice miso paste
- 2 spoonfuls plain flour
- 350 mls organic whole milk
- 250 mls chicken stock
- 200 g fresh spinach
- 1 bunch fresh tarragon
- 1 bunch fresh parsley
- 1 whole pre-cooked chicken breast, thigh and leg meat removed from the chicken and shredded – approx. 400g meat.
- 500 g baby potatoes Pre-boiled, cubed
- salt & pepper
Instructions
STEP 1:
- Start by gathering all of the ingredients together.
- Wash and finely chop the shallots, celery and leek. Place them in a large pan with the ghee and cook over a low heat until the ghee has melted whilst stirring to ensure an even coating of the fat over the ingredients. Place a lid on the pan and leave to cook gently over a low heat for a further 5 minutes to allow to soften.
STEP 2:
- After around 5 minutes, remove the pan from the heat and stir through the minced garlic, miso paste (or mustard) and flour.
STEP 3:
- Return the pan to the heat and very gradually pour the milk and the stock into the pan while stirring and heat gently for a few minutes. The aim is to thicken the liquid and this happens with a gradual adding, stirring and heating of the liquid and dry flour mixture which has fat in it (ghee). You do not need the sauce to thicken completely as it will continue to do this when baking in the oven.
STEP 4:
- Next, add the washed spinach leaves to the pan.
- Remove the fresh herbs from their stems and add those to the pan also. Stir through and allow the spinach to wilt a little which will reduce it's volume.
STEP 5:
- Now, add the cooked potatoes and cooked shredded chicken to the pan and give it all a good stir to combine all of the ingredients together. Season to taste with good quality sea salt and ground black pepper.
STEP 6:
- Pour the pan contents into your oven-proof dish.
- You can stop the recipe at this stage if you would like to eat the pie the following day. Simply cover and place in the fridge.
- If you would like to keep the filling for a longer period before using, you can freeze it by storing it in a container suitable for the freezer. Simply remove from the freezer 24hrs before you would like to use it and allow to defrost fully in the fridge before following STEP 7: Topping and Baking the Pie.
STEP 7: Topping and Baking the Chicken, Spinach & Tarragon Filo Pastry Topped Pie
- Remove the filo pastry from the fridge just before using it (filo pastry dry's out quickly once removed from the fridge).
- Using clean hands, take one piece of the filo pastry and scrunch it together to the size of roughly 1/5 of the size of your baking dish. Place it on top of the pie filling. Continue with the remaining 4 pieces of filo pastry until you have covered the whole pie.
- Brush the filo pastry with a pastry brush and some melted butter.
STEP 8:
- NOTE: There are 2 ways of baking the pie depending on the temperature of the filling when assembled:
- Version 1: If the filling was assembled using warm ingredients (chicken has just been roasted and potatoes have just been boiled): Bake the pie in a pre-heated oven at 180 degrees C (fan) for 20-25 minutes .
- Version 2: If the pie filling has been kept in the fridge: Bake the pie filling for 15 minutes BEFORE adding the filo topping. After 15 minutes, carefully remove the pie from the oven, add the filo pastry as described above and return the pie to the oven for a further 20-25 mins. This extra cooking time is needed as the pie filling will require longer to cook from fridge temperature but the filo pastry would burn if left cooking for the extra cooking time.
- Check the pie filling is steaming hot before serving.
- Serve with steamed greens.
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