Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Chicken Pot Pie


This is the best Chicken Pot Pie ever!  The crust is what really makes this pie.  It isn't really a crust, but crumbles of flour, butter, heavy cream, fresh Parmesan cheese, baking powder and salt.  How can that be wrong?  I think we could have just eaten the pan of crumbles and been happy.

THE WORLD'S BEST CHICKEN POT PIE
This is America's Test Kitchen's Pot Pie, modified to omit MUSHROOMS!
  • 1-1/2 lbs. boneless skinless chicken breasts (you can use a mix of thighs and breasts if you like that sort of thing)
  • 3 cups chicken broth
  • 1 T. olive oil
  • 1 cup carrots, diced
  • 4 ribs celery, diced
  • 1 small onion, diced
  • 3/4 frozen peas
  • 3 potatoes, cooked and diced
  • 4 T. butter
  • 1/2 cup flour
  • 3 cups broth (that the chicken was poached in)
  • 1 cup milk
  • 2 t. lemon juice
  • Salt and pepper to taste
Crust:
  • 2 cups flour
  • 2 t. baking powder
  • 3/4 t. salt
  • 1/4 t. pepper
  • 6 T. chilled butter
  • 1/2 cup fresh Parmesan cheese, finely grated
  • 3/4 cup plus 2 T. heavy cream
Place chicken breasts and broth in a large pot.  Bring to a simmer and cover for about 15 minutes, until chicken breasts are cooked through.  Remove chicken from broth.  Strain broth through a fine strainer.  Set broth aside.  Shred chicken.  While chicken is cooking, peel and dice 3 potatoes.  Steam in microwave for 5 minutes, or until soft.  (I just put diced potatoes in microwave safe bowl with a 2 tablespoons water and cover plastic wrap.)  In same pot that you cooked the chicken, add oil, carrots, onions and celery.  Saute for about a minute on medium heat and then cover the pot to steam the veggies for 7 to 10 minutes, until wilted and soft, occasionally stirring to be sure they are just wilting, not burning.  Add veggies to a bowl with shredded chicken.  Preheat oven to 450 degrees. 

Time to make crumbles.  Combine dry ingredients.  Cut in butter until the texture is that of coarse cornmeal.  Mix in cream and Parmesan.  Stir until all floury bits are wet. 




Pour dough out onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper and crumble/tear the dough into small pieces, about 1/2 inches in size.  There will be some very fine bits and some larger pieces.  Bake in oven for 10 to 13 minutes, until very lightly browned. 




While this is baking you will make your sauce.  In the same pot that you cooked the chicken and veggies, melt butter.  Once butter is melted whisk in flour, whisking for about 1 minute.  Slowly add the chicken broth, whisking vigorously to avoid lumps.  Add milk.  Bring to a simmer, until you see bubbles form around the edges of the pot and reduce heat, stirring until thickened, about 3 to 5 minutes.  Turn off heat and add chicken, veggies, potatoes and frozen peas.  Stir to combine. 




Pour into a 13x9 inch casserole dish.  By this time you should have removed your crumbles from the oven.  Carefully re-crumble the crumbles (careful they will be hot!) and cover the top of the filling.  This will seem like a lot of topping (until you eat it...you will wish there was more.)  Place pie into the 450 degree oven for 12 to 15 minutes, until filling is bubbling (which was already hot to begin with) and crumbles are golden brown.



Find more yummy recipes at Tasty Tuesday.

3 comments:

  1. We love chicken pot pie here! This looks much, much healthier than the icky frozen ones from the store. Thanks for sharing. :) Visiting from Tasty Tuesday. Hope you'll stop by my blog to say hi. :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. That looks so good!I cannot wait to make it. Pot Pie is such a great comfort food.

    ReplyDelete
  3. This looks amazing!! So glad you omitted the mushrooms - gross. Love the new springy blog look!
    Mrs. P

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