Chicken and Ham Pie
Vaguely remembered from a television program I once saw. Possibly Heston Blumenthal, Possibly Jimmy Savile.
Vaguely remembered from a television program I once saw. Possibly Heston Blumenthal, Possibly Jimmy Savile.
- -- sauce --
- 1 medium egg
- 1 liter water
- -- chicken --
- 80 gram salt
- 8 ea chicken thighs boned and skinned (keep skin)
- 500 mililiters stock, chicken
- -- leeks --
- 2 tablespoons oil, grapeseed or groundnut
- reserved chicken skin from thighs
- 300 gram leek (white portion only) sliced
- -- button mushrooms --
- 250 gram mushroom, button
- 25 gram butter, unsalted
- 120 mililiters wine, dry, white
- 135 mililiters cream, double
- 90 mililiters stock, chicken
- 1 tablespoon agar agar flakes
- -- assembly --
- 200 gram ham hock cooked and chopped into small pieces
- 25 gram mustard, wholegrain
- 15 gram mustard, dijon
- 10 gram parsley, flat leaf
- 1 pinch pepper, black
- 250 gram pastry, puff
- Carbohydrate 60.2386362501374 g
- Cholesterol 242.669125 mg
- Fat 74.8397650000006 g
- Fiber 9.83537504411762 g
- Protein 46.515115000011 g
- Saturated Fat 25.2763471250001 g
- Serving Size 1 1 Serving (861g)
- Sodium 1209.30787500018 mg
- Sugar 50.4032612060198 g
- Trans Fat 4.89364600000022 g
- Calories 1101 calories
Step-by-step
- Place the brine in a bowl big enough to contain the chicken thighs. Add the chicken to the water and leave in the brine for 5 hours or overnight.
- Rinse the chicken under cold running water for 5 minutes, then pat dry with kitchen roll. Store in the fridge until needed.
- As an alternative to all chicken thigh, you can use a mix of chicken breast fillets and thigh.
- Preheat the oven to 85-90C.
- Place the brined chicken thighs in an ovenproof saucepan and cover with 500ml of chicken stock. Bring the stock to a simmer over a medium heat then place in the oven for 1 hour 30 minutes.
- Allow the chicken to cool in the liquid before removing and dicing. Retain 90ml of the chicken stock for the sauce which will bind the pies. (The remaining stock can be used for soups or sauces).
- If you need to store the chicken in the fridge at this stage (overnight) you will need to re-warm it up the next morning or it's going to be rubbish.
- Seal the chicken in bags with the stock.
- Cook at 72C for 3-6 hours (thigh) or 66C for 2-4 hours (breast). If you only have one sous vide, cook all as if thigh.
- Allow the chicken to cool in the liquid before removing and dicing.
- In the meantime, cook the leeks. Place the pan over a medium-high heat. Add the chicken skin and render the fat from it for 10-15 minutes. Remove the skin and discard.
- Reduce the heat to medium and add the leeks to the fat. Cook until completely soft (approximately 15 minutes), then allow to cool in the pan.
- Alternatively, render the chicken fat the induction kenwood at 140C, and then cook the leeks in the fat for about 15 minutes at 130C.
- To cook the mushrooms, place a pan over a medium-high heat. Add the butter and when melted, add the mushrooms and cook until lightly colored (approximately 5 minutes). Drain the mushrooms on a plate covered with kitchen paper.
- Mushrooms can also be cooked in the induction kenwood.
- Reduce the white wine in the Kenwood or an open Thermomix until it's a syrup consistency.
- For the sauce, put the cream, reduced wine, whole milk and reserved chicken stock into Thermomix (or a pan) and bring to a simmer over a medium heat (90C on the Thermomix). Sprinkle in the agar agar flakes and run the thermomix at max speed for 10 seconds to incorporate.
- Simmer for 4 minutes then allow to cool and blitz thoroughly with a hand blender, or Thermomix up to max speed again.
- Mix the chicken thigh meat, diced ham, leeks, mushrooms, wholegrain and Dijon mustards together, then add the sauce. Finely chop the parsley and add it to the mixture. Season with salt and a pinch of freshly ground black pepper and stir until all the ingredients are well combined. Pour into a family-sized pie dish (approximately 28cm in length).
- Roll the pastry on a lightly floured surface until 5mm thick. Lay over the pie dish and fold the overhang around the lip of the dish to seal the edges. Rest for 15 minutes in the fridge.
- Crimp the edges of the pie with a fork for decoration then, using a pastry brush, coat the top of the pie with the beaten egg.
- When ready to assemble and cook the pie, preheat the oven to 215C.
- Place the pie in the oven for approximately 15 minutes or until the pastry turns golden on top.
- If cooking pies from frozen, cook in the oven for 30 minutes at 150C and then 15 mins at 215C or until golden. But it's best to defrost the pies first.
Brining chicken thighs for at least five hours is non-negotiable for retaining moisture through prolonged cooking. Skipping this saline immersion yields stringy meat that dries out entirely beneath the pastry crust. Beyond the meat preparation, rendering reserved chicken fat over medium-high heat for ten to fifteen minutes creates the ideal cooking medium for leeks, imparting a savory depth that neutral oil simply cannot replicate.
Achieving structural integrity in the filling requires precise handling of the gelling agent. Agar agar demands a full four-minute simmer to activate properly before blending, otherwise the dairy and stock sauce fails to set and leaks out upon slicing. When incorporating the white wine reduction, reduce the liquid until it reaches a syrupy consistency to concentrate acidity and cut through the richness of double cream.
Resting the assembled pie in the refrigerator for fifteen minutes prior to baking firms the puff pastry fats, ensuring maximum steam pockets and a flaky final crust.
