Last week a very generous friend and foodie gifted me with a whole lotta chicken, left-overs from a fourth of July barbeque. What to do with five pounds of big ass drumsticks and thigh parts? I'm a white meat gal, so once I've picked a roasted chicken over of all it's white bits (more often than not consumed whilst standing over the cutting board) for pesto chicken sandwiches, I shred and dice everything else up to be made into a Chicken Pot Pie. That's what.
I wish I could say this was a simple refrigerator rescue, but I had to start with caramelized onions and those take about an hour. Then I tossed half inch dices of carrots, potatoes and asparagus with olive oil, rosemary, thyme, oregano, kosher salt and fresh ground pepper in a bowl and then spread it all out on two baking sheets. I tend to go pretty heavy on the veg since it usually turns out that's what needs the rescue and the vegetables need to be spread out for optimal roasting or they end up just steaming if too crowded. I've done that and it's distressing after wasting an hour in the oven and gingerly tossing them every 15 minutes trying to avoid spilling steamy hot veggie bits on my feet only to wind up with something that could of taken all of 10 minutes on the stove-top.
Perhaps one day I'll attempt to scribble out a recipe but generally with soups and stews it's all improvised. The trick, I find, is getting enough liquid in the pot by adding chicken stock (4-6 cups), seasoning or boullion (I used powdered packets-one per cup of liquid) and white wine, sherry or vermouth, then reducing while tasting for flavor but then to get a nice thickish gravyish element into the pot pie, you need to stir in a flour and softened butter roux (start with one tablespoon of flour to two tablespoons of softened butter).
I ended up with a lot of filling which filled my 3 smallish casserole dishes so I decided to have some fun with the topping. I scooped up some leftover polenta over one, topping it of with some grated parmesean. The second pie was topped with an herb biscuit crust and the last one had a cheesy version of herb biscuit crust.
I used my small cookie dough/ice cream scoop to apply the biscuit dough. I love how they look.
Perhaps one day I'll attempt to scribble out a recipe but generally with soups and stews it's all improvised. The trick, I find, is getting enough liquid in the pot by adding chicken stock (4-6 cups), seasoning or boullion (I used powdered packets-one per cup of liquid) and white wine, sherry or vermouth, then reducing while tasting for flavor but then to get a nice thickish gravyish element into the pot pie, you need to stir in a flour and softened butter roux (start with one tablespoon of flour to two tablespoons of softened butter).
I ended up with a lot of filling which filled my 3 smallish casserole dishes so I decided to have some fun with the topping. I scooped up some leftover polenta over one, topping it of with some grated parmesean. The second pie was topped with an herb biscuit crust and the last one had a cheesy version of herb biscuit crust.
I used my small cookie dough/ice cream scoop to apply the biscuit dough. I love how they look.
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