Chicken Pot Pie

Chicken pot pie is actually a very popular dish in America and Europe. But we Bengalis know no regionalism when it comes to food. They are truly omnivorous. So, this spring, baking a nice pie will give your mind a blossom.

Though this dish needs no introduction, still when there is Wikipedia, you are tempted to get the information and fill your blog page with it ! Lol ! A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that covers or completely contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients.

Pies are defined by their crusts. A filled pie (also single-crust or bottom-crust), has pastry lining the baking dish, and the filling is placed on top of the pastry but left open. A top-crust pie has the filling in the bottom of the dish and is covered with a pastry or other covering before baking. A two-crust pie has the filling completely enclosed in the pastry shell. Shortcrust pastry is a typical kind of pastry used for pie crusts, but many things can be used, including baking powder biscuits, mashed potatoes, and crumbs.

Reading the history of the pie in the Wikipedia page, I found it really interesting. It says, (I am reproducing it from the wikipedia page itself), ”The need for nutritious, easy-to-store, easy-to-carry, and long-lasting foods on long journeys, in particular at sea, was initially solved by taking live food along with a butcher or cook. However, this took up additional space on what were either horse-powered treks or small ships, reducing the time of travel before additional food was required. This resulted in early armies adopting the style of hunter-foraging.

The introduction of the baking of processed cereals including the creation of flour, provided a more reliable source of food. Egyptian sailors carried a flat brittle bread loaf of millet bread called dhourra cake, while the Romans had a biscuit called buccellum.

Early pies were in the form of flat, round or freeform crusty cakes called galettes consisting of a crust of ground oats, wheat, rye,or barley containing honey inside. These galettes developed into a form of early sweet pastry or desserts, evidence of which can be found on the tomb walls of the Pharaoh Ramesses II, who ruled from 1304 to 1237 BC, located in the Valley of the Kings. Sometime before 2000 BC, a recipe for chicken pie was written on a tablet in Sumer.

Ancient Greeks are believed to have originated pie pastry. In the plays of Aristophanes (5th century BC), there are mentions of sweetmeats including small pastries filled with fruit. Nothing is known of the actual pastry used, but the Greeks certainly recognized the trade of pastry-cook as distinct from that of baker. (When fat is added to a flour-water paste it becomes a pastry.) The Romans made a plain pastry of flour, oil, and water to cover meats and fowls which were baked, thus keeping in the juices. (The covering was not meant to be eaten; it filled the role of what was later called puff paste.) A richer pastry, intended to be eaten, was used to make small pasties containing eggs or little birds which were among the minor items served at banquets.

The 1st-century Roman cookbook Apicius makes various mentions of recipes which involve a pie case. By 160 BC, Roman statesman Marcus Porcius Cato (234–149 BC), who wrote De Agri Cultura, notes the recipe for the most popular pie/cake called placenta. Also called libum by the Romans, it was more like a modern-day cheesecake on a pastry base, often used as an offering to the gods. With the development of the Roman Empire and its efficient road transport, pie cooking spread throughout Europe.

Pies remained as a staple of travelling and working peoples in the colder northern European countries, with regional variations based on both the locally grown and available meats, as well as the locally farmed cereal crop. The Cornish pastry is an adaptation of the pie to a working man's daily food needs. Medieval cooks had restricted access to ovens due to their costs of construction and need for abundant supplies of fuel. Pies could be easily cooked over an open fire, while partnering with a baker allowed them to cook the filling inside their own locally defined casing. The earliest pie-like recipes refer to coffyns (the word actually used for a basket or box), with straight sealed sides and a top; open-top pies were referred to as traps. The resulting hardened pastry was not necessarily eaten, its function being to contain the filling for cooking, and to store it, though whether servants may have eaten it once their masters had eaten the filling is impossible to prove. This may also be the reason why early recipes focus on the filling over the surrounding case, with the partnership development leading to the use of reusable earthenware pie cases which reduced the use of expensive flour.”

It reminds me of the article I have read a few days ago which mentioned that the recipe of the famous Rajasthani Laal Maas was actually invented as a staple food for the Rajputs during their hunting. The ingredients used in that recipe are only those which can be easily carried and stored for a long time so that the Rajputs could carry those while going for hunting.

Well, enough of history. Let’s focus on the recipe of our Chicken Pot Pie now. Here, I am going to make a double crust one.

  

Preparation Time – 30 mins + 1 hour for chilling the dough, Baking Time – 30-35 mins, Serving – 4-6

Ingredients:

For the filling:

1. Boneless Chicken – 400 gms, cut into small pieces
2. Carrot – 1 large, cut into small dice
3. Beans – 125 gms, cut into thin ring
4. Capsicum – 2 medium, cut into small dice
5. Peas- 2 fistful
6. Potato – 1 medium, cut into small dice
7. Onion – 1 ½ medium
8. Butter – 40 gms
9. Flour- ¾ cup
10. Milk – 1 cup
11. Salt- to taste
12. Sugar – 1 tbsp (optional)
13. Back pepper powder – 1 tsp
14. Oregano – to sprinkle
15. Chicken stock – 2 cups

For pastry:

1. Flour – 3 cup + to roll out
2. Salt – 1 tsp
3. Sugar – 1 tsp
4. Butter – 60 gms
5. Baking powder – 1 tbsp
6. Ice water – as required

For Egg wash:

1. Egg – 1 no.
2. Water / milk – 1 tbsp

Method:

First, prepare the filling of the pie. For this, put the chicken and all the vegetables in a pan. Pour 2 cups of water and cover. Let it boil over medium flame for 15 mins.

After 15 mins, when the chicken and all the vegetables get tender, turn the heat off. Drain the stock and keep it aside.

Heat the butter in a pan. Add the onion and fry it till it gets translucent.

Add the flour and stir for 1 min.

Then add the chicken stock and keep on stirring continuously to avoid the lump formation.

Add the milk and mix it well.

Then add all the boiled vegetables and chicken. Mix it well with the flour gravy. The flour with butter, milk and chicken stock forms the white sauce which look like a thick gravy. Mix the chicken and the vegetable very well to get them coated with the white sauce evenly.

Sprinkle the seasoning of salt, sugar, pepper powder and oregano. Mix them.

Turn the heat off and keep it aside.

Now, it’s time to prepare the pastry dough. For this, mix all the dry ingredients and butter very well. By slowly adding chilled water, prepare a soft dough.

Refrigerate the dough for at least one hour.

After an hour, take the dough out from the fridge. Wait for 10 more minutes.

Divide the dough into two. Take one at a time and roll it out on a lightly floured surface. You have to roll out the dough as per the diameter of your baking pan. Mine was a 9 inch springform pan and the ingredients I mentioned here are appropriate for this.

Once you roll out one dough, place it on the bottom of your baking pan. The diameter of your rolled out dough must be 2 inch bigger than that of your pan. Press the excess 1 inch of dough on the side of the pan firmly to form a rim.

You may make wavy design by putting your both the index fingers, one above the dough and the other below it. Continue the process throughout the rim.

Your bottom pie crust is ready.

Then, pour out the filling on this bottom pie crust up to the level of the rim.

Roll out the other dough similarly and place it on the top of the filling.

Form similar wavy shape on the sides of the dough with the same alignment with that of on the bottom crust. Press both the crust together to cover the filling completely.

Make some slits on the top crust to allow the steam to escape while baking. For this, I inscribed my signature  Lol !

Beat the egg with 1 spoonful of water. Brush the egg mixture on the top crust. This egg wash will result in a marvellous golden brown glaze after baking.

Bake your pie in a pre-heated oven for 30-35 mins at a temperature of 170^o C or till the top crust turns golden brown.

I must mention here that, every oven has its own specification and only you can judge your oven the best. So, use the temperature and the time which you feel is right for your oven. Mine is a Bajaj 22lt OTG. And the aforesaid specification yields perfect output.

After baking, let it cool slightly for 10 mins on the wire rack. Then indulge yourself into a generous portion of it.

Share the pie over the table with your loved ones.

Chicken Yakhni Pulao

This time of the year the whole Delhi is celebrating Navratri. They are having fast for the whole 9 days at a stretch, having fruits only diet, and of course, a strict NO-NO to non-vegetarian food. Well, Bengalis are always the exception! And when it comes to food, they don’t follow any rituals which bar them from having their favourite dishes. So, naturally, even this time of the year, my refrigerator is full of chicken, fish, egg – whatsoever it may be possible. And on Sunday, both my culinary passion and my taste buds crave for something delicious, something scrumptious and obviously, something non-veg! Oh dear, be it the first day of the Navratri, I just can’t waste my Sunday lunch with vegetarian food just like other Bengalis. I remember during my childhood, it would be a rare occasion not to have mutton (Khasir mangso) on Sunday lunch. Though I don’t follow this now regularly, but still, there must be something special on the dining table on Sunday.

So, this Sunday, I prepared Chicken Yakhni Pulao. Yakhni Pulao is a Persian delicacy which was introduced to the Indian by Mughal Rulers. By the Nawabs of Lucknow or Awadh, it was made more popular. Though the authenticated Yakhni Pulao is generally made of mutton, we have made our own improvisation to prepare the same dish with chicken too. Yakhni, or the broth or stock is with its simplest term means the stew cooked with the meat and spices. The yakhni pulao is basically the pulao which is cooked in the yakhni. Sounds similar to the biryani, right? The basic difference between both the dishes is that the yakhni pulao is made by cooking the meat along with aromatic spices in water till the meat is tender, then adding the rice in the meat broth along with meat which is then sealed and cooked till it's done, whereas in case of biryani, the rice is boiled or parboiled separately in spiced water and then layered with separately cooked meat, which is then sealed and cooked over low heat till it's done. So, the method  of preparation is a bit easier in case of Yakhni Pulao, which is more or a less a one pot meal with rice and meat cooked together. But the aroma and taste.. just out  of  the world ! 

Let’s begin with the recipe now….

Preparation Time – 20 mins, Cooking Time – 40 mins, Serving – 3-4

Ingredients:

For the  Yakhni:

1. Chicken – 600 gms, cut into medium sized pieces, cleaned and skinned
2. Bay leave – 2 nos.
3. Onion – ½ of a medium sized onion, cut into 4 dices
4. Garlic – 2 cloves
5. Ginger – 1 inch piece
6. Cumin – ½ tsp
7. Coriander – ½ tsp
8. Kabab chini – ½ tsp
9. Shahi jeera – ½ tsp
10. White pepper (sha morich as we call it in Bengali) – ½ tsp
11. Black peppercorn – ½ tsp
12. Nutmeg – ½ inch piece
13. Mace – 1 flower
14. Saunf – ½ tsp
15. Green cardamom – 3-4 nos.
16. Clove – 4-5 nos.
17. Cinnamon  -  2 inch stick
18. Dry red chilli – 1-2
19. Water – 1 ½ times the volume of the rice + ¾ cup

For the pulao:

1. Basmati rice – 300 gms (it is a thumb rule for Pulao or biryani to use the rice weighing half the meat), washed and drained
2. Ghee – 1 tbsp
3. Olive oil – 1 tbsp
4. Onion – 2 medium
5. Green chilli – 2 nos.
6. Ginger-garlic paste – 1 tbsp
7. Yogurt – 4 tbsp
8. Tomato – 1 medium
9. Red chilli powder – 1 tsp
10. Salt – to taste
11. Sugar – 2 tsp

Method:

First, you are going to prepare the yakhni… the main part of the whole preparation. For that, tie up all the whole spices mentioned for yakhni in a piece of muslin. In a deep pan, put the muslin bundle along with the chicken. Pour the water you have measured. Let me explain the water measurement for your convenience. Measure the rice in any utensil as per your availability and convenience. It may be in a bowl or in a cup. Say for example, 300 gms of rice is measured as 2 cups of rice. Now, you have to take 1 ½ times of water, i.e, 3 cups of water, measured in the same cup you used for measuring the rice. Then, pour a little extra, say, ¾ cup.

Then put the pan on the gas oven over a low flame. Cover it. Keep it for 20-25 mins.

By the time your yakhni is being prepared, you can make your other preparation. Such as, slice the onion and tomato, beat the yogurt to have a smooth texture and spread the washed rice on a flat plate to dry it up.

After 20-25 mins, the spices in the muslin bundle, will infuse all their aroma in the water. The chicken has its own flavour too. And by this time, the chicken will get tender also.

Moreover, the water in the pan will be reduced to the desired quantity. The extra amount we have put, would have been evaporated. The water left in the pan is just the appropriate amount we need to cook your rice.

Take the muslin bundle out of the pan. Keep it aside. Drain the chicken pieces and keep aside them too.

Now, take the spices out from the muslin and make a paste of it (except for the bay leaves). It may sound a bit weird or you may think the spices have already released their aroma, so the paste will be of no use. But trust me, it is not. It will give the richness of flavour in your rice. Moreover, it’s always better to use it than to waste, isn’t it? Even otherwise, you would have to add some spices to the pulao for the intricate flavours. But as you have already used these spices, and your yakhni is infused with their aroma, adding more fresh spices would have make your pulao too loaded with fragrances. By using these boiled spice paste, you can make your pulao simple yet extraordinary.

To cook the pulao, heat ghee and oil in a pan or pressure cooker. Add the bay leaves you kept aside taken from the muslin out. Add sliced onion and fry it till golden brown.

Add tomato and let it get soft.

Then add rest of the ingredients mentioned for pulao. Cook them till they start releasing oil.

Add the chicken and the spice paste. Cook it for another 2-3 mins.

Then add the rice and the yakhni water.

Cover your pan and let the rice cook over high flame till the water dries up and rice gets fully cooked. If you are using pressure cooker, cover the lid and cook it over high flame till the whistle is about to blow. Try not to let the whistle blow so that the aromatic vapour may be kept inside the cooker only.

When you open the pan or the pressure cooker, all your senses will be filled up with heavenly fragrances… a combination of whole spices, ghee, chicken, basmati rice… just out of the world !

Serve it. Don’t overdo it with any side dish. Better serve it with simple cucumber raita.