Chicken, Leek and Mushroom pie

Ingredients:

1Kg Chicken Thigh Chopped (or you can use marylands from the butcher these will be cheaper)

1 Leek Sliced

2 Onions Chopped

3 cloves of crushed garlic

300gm Mushrooms

1 Tbs of butter

1 Tbs Olive Oil

½ Cup of Chicken stock

2 Tbs of Plane Flour

5 Sprigs of Thyme

¼ Cup of White wine

Handful of Chopped Parsley

Two sheets of puff pastry

Method

In a pot Sauté Leek, onion and garlic with butter, Olive oil and salt and pepper till soft, add mushrooms, cook until mushrooms are cooked, you may need to add some more butter.

In a frying pan brown off the chicken in batches then add to the onions and mushrooms.

Deglaze the pan that cooked the chicken with the white wine and pour into the rest of the mix.

Add the Stock, Thyme and Flour (I use a tea strainer to sprinkle the flour so there are no lumps), let the mixture bubble for at least 20 minutes allowing the liquid to thicken and the starch to cook out of the flour add parsley at the end.

Pour mixture into an oven proof dish and place puff pastry on top and then put in the oven for 35 minutes till the pastry is golden brown.  

Serve with green beans.

Melting Moments / Yoyo’s

“when I was little I used to take these to Footy cause the cost of yoyo’s was stupidly expensive”

Biscuits

125g softened Butter (room Temperature)

40g or 1/4 Cup icing sugar

1 ts Vanilla Essence

3/4 Cup plain flour

50g or 1/3cup Custard Powder (i recommend white wings brand)

Icing

80g/ ½ Cup of Icing Sugar  
2 ts of hot water 

Lemon juice or Vanilla Essence to taste

1.       Cream the butter till it goes lighter in colour then add the Icing sugar and Vanilla.

2.       Add the flours and mix to combine.

3.       Roll into balls, press with a fork and put in a moderate oven (180 Degrees) for 15 Minutes.

4.       For the Icing, add the icing sugar and water together, you may need to add more icing sugar or water to get the icing to a thick consistency (and lemon or Vanilla.)

5.       Once the biscuits are completely cooled put some icing between two biscuits.

Notes: I prefer the water based icing opposed to the butter cream icing. I also use the white wings vanilla custard because for my first test batch I used the Foster and Clarks custard powder and there were little bright orange dots all the way through the mix. The photo below shows both versions - the one on the right has the bright dots and has butter cream icing.

Jelly Slice

“When I was growing up my dad and I loved jelly slice, we would get so excited when we would find it at fates and bakeries, so when I found this County Women’s association recipe I was so excited I could make it at home and realised how easy it was to make”

Base

1 packet of Marie biscuits finely crushed (I use a small food processor)

170g Butter melted

Filling

1x400g sweetened condensed milk

Juice of 2 lemons

3 teaspoons of gelatine

¼ Cup boiling water

Jelly topping

1x85g packet of raspberry or strawberry jelly

1.       Mix the biscuits and butter together and press firmly into the base of a square tin, (I use a 22 by 32cm tin) put in the fridge to harden.

2.       In a bowl combine Condensed milk, Lemon Juice and Gelatine (dissolved in the boiling water) then spread evenly onto the biscuit base then put in the fridge to set.

3.       Make up jelly as per the packet, cool then poor over the slice, (I pour the jelly over the slice while it is in the fridge otherwise it is difficult to take to the fridge without spilling)

4.       Chill until sett then cut into slices to serve.