Potato, tomato and onion pie

 How do you define a pie?  Because frankly, this dish is very possibly not one.  But look, shut up okay, it's full of potato and what more do you want? So it's kind of a casserole, layered like a lasagne, but in a pie dish, and crunchy on top.  It's classic peasant/student fare, and given the December Austerity Measures this should free up enough coin to subsidise the high quality cooking chocolate I need for all my Christmassy treats and not at all for gnawing on after dinner.


Ingredients:

• 2 potatoes
• 3 tomatoes
• 1 onion
• 1 teaspoon wholeseed mustard
• slice of butter
• olive oil 
• salt and pepper  

Brush a pie dish with olive oil and turn the oven on to 180 C. Melt the butter with the mustard and add salt and pepper.  Then finely slice everything.

Line the pie dish first with a layer of potatoes, then onion, then tomato.  Add half the mustardy butter mixture.  Repeat. 

Top with potato and brush the top with olive oil.  Sprinkle with salt if you know what's good for you.

Cover with foil and put in the oven.  After 30 minutes remove the foil and turn the oven up to 190.  Remove after another 30 minutes.


Consume.

Breakfast pie

This weekend I'm going away with my family for three days of sailing.  It's going to be sunny, gorgeous and relaxing.  There's also going to be six hungry people and one teeny tiny galley.  So I pondered what to bring that would be wholesome and nourishing and delicious and easy to prepare.  The first thing I thought of was Egg and Bacon Pie!  But there will be vegetarians in our midst, so I removed the bacon and added other things to make: Breakfast Pie!

You could make this pie with anything you want. As long as it has eggs.


Ingredients:

• Puff pastry
• 10 eggs
• 1 punnet of grape tomatoes
• Baby spinach, a handful, chopped
• Grated tasty cheese (approx 150g or as much as you want)
• salt and pepper to season
• olive oil
• balsamic vinegar

I decided to prepare my tomatoes before putting them in my pie to make them extra tomatoey, tangy and succulent.  Chop them in half, drizzle olive oil and balsamic over them and season with salt and pepper.  Put them in the oven at about 140 C for about 20 minutes or until they are just starting to burn a little and get sticky on the bottom. 

Next, prepare your pie pan.  Take two sheets of pastry out of the oven and let them defrost, then preheat the oven to 200 Celcius (or 220 C if your oven isn't fan forced).  Grease your pie pan and lay a sheet of pasty across it.  Using a fork, prick tiny wholes in the bottom of the pastry to help the base get crispy when it bakes.

Mix your ingredients.  Start by lightly whisking nine eggs.  Add the spinach, tomatoes, cheese and salt and pepper to taste and toss through. 

Pour this mixture into your pie base and sit the chimney in the middle. Cut a slit in the other sheet of pastry to fit over your pie chimney, if you're using one.  Press the edges of the pastry together with your thumbs and trim the excess pastry. Then, and this is very important, cut some kind of daggy decoration out of the pastry remainders.  Mine says "PIE"!

Brush the top of your pie with egg wash and put it in the oven for 20-25 minutes.  Once it's cooled, simply slice and serve.

You could put anything you fancy in this pie.  I tend to think along lines you might associate with omelettes.  I had meant to add olives, but when the time for mixing ingredients came, I simply forgot.  Fetta would work well if you prefer it to tasty cheese, and capsicum and mushrooms would be perfect.  Carnivores should dabble with bacon or sucuk.

PIE! (made with Rhubarb and Raspberries)

This weekend I had an essay to write. So I made a pie. A scrumptious pie with light crumbly pastry and tart spicy fillings. And it made Winter seem ok yesterday, when I had two pieces. And also this morning when I had some more for breakfast.

Ingredients (filling)

• I bunch of rhubarb, trimmed and cut to 1 inch chunks
• frozen raspberries
• 1 cup caster sugar
• spices for fruit poaching (cinnamon, cloves, vanilla and ginger the non-negotiables)
• 1/2 cup orange juice
• water

Ingredients (pastry)

• 250g unsalted butter, cubed
• 4-5 tablespoons iced water
• 450g flour
• caster sugar (i just threw it in as an afterthought - probably about 30g worth, but you could use more)

Now pie is not for a hasty gastronome. No, it is for a gastronome who is tied to the house because she has to write an essay. Because you want to let that pastry chill at every opportunity (minimum two hours). I chilled mine at every stage in the process. I started it at 3pm, by the time we ate the pie it was 9pm. Got that? Also, let it be said that having a kitchen as freezing as mine is in Winter is a real perk when making pastry.

But time aside, pastry is super dooper easy to make, as long as you know what you're shooting for. Start by putting all your ingredients in the fridge or freezer for at least 30 mins. Then, take your butter, flour and sugar and put them in a mixer.

Leave a smidgen of butter aside for greasing your pie pan later. Pulse the ingredients until they starts to resemble course crumbs. Add the icy water little by little, until you've added about 5 tablespoons worth. Don't over mix it, this is imperative. It shouldn't take to long. Tip it out onto a floured surface and smoosh the mixture together into two mishapen balls. It will stick together if you apply a bit of pressure.

Chill.

Prepare your filling. Put everything except the raspberries in a saucepan. Add water so that it's about 1 inch deep in the bottom of the pan.

Bring to the boil, stirring regularly so that the sugar dissolves. Turn off the heat once the rhubarb starts to soften an get a bit mushy, and once the mixture is getting thick. The rhubarb will continue to soften in the heat of the mixture. Leave to cool on the stove top.

While your fruit is cooling prepare your pie pan. Then take one of your balls of dough and roll it gently onto a floured surface. And be patient (not like me), roll it out slowly, incrementally, to keep it even and prevent it from splitting and from being overworked. Roll it to about 5mm thick, because pastry is super yummy and you don't want to skimp.

Line your pie pan, keeping any scraps, and once again, chill it in the fridge.

Once the fruit mix is cooled to close to luke warm, add your raspberries and mix through. Leave to cool thoroughly.

In an hour or so,  once the fruit mix is room temperature, prepare your pie completely. First, take your remaining  ball of dough and roll it out. Then pour your filling into your pie base, remembering to place your pie chimney in the centre*. Cut a small slit from your rolled out pastry to fit over your chimney and lie the top over the dish.

Trim the edges and then press the two pieces of pastry together, crimping with your thumb, to seal the pie.

Depending on the size of your pie dish you may want to keep your remaining pastry - it can be frozen for up to 3 months and save you lots of time later. Otherwise, you can roll it out and cut decorations from it, because that essay still isn't finished and it seems like a good use of your time. Then dust the whole thing with sugar, because you're not sure you made the pastry sweet enough, and it sure as hell can't hurt.

Chill, until about an hour before you want to eat it.  Bake it for 20 minutes in a hot oven (200-210 C degrees) and then for another 30 minutes at 180 C. If your oven isn't fan forced you may want to leave it in another 5 mins or so.

Then consume with vanilla ice cream with your boyfriend and dinner guests, and again for breakfast the next day, and again and again until there's none left.  Call your trash-talking friends and announce you are ready for a pie off, whenever they're feeling game. Sit back and feel smug. Then remember your essay.

*A pie chimney or pie vent allows steam to escape from the centre of the pie, as the filling heats in the oven, thus preventing leakage out the sides, and stopping the pastry from going soggy.