Chicken Pie

It has well and truly felt like winter the last couple of weeks (finally!) meaning I’ve been turning to more homely, hearty dishes -such as this classic chicken dish- to warm me up. The beauty of this is in its simplicity and that it can be adapted to make into a pie, or just to eat with rice or mash. Either way – add some seasonal veg, keep the carbs wholegrain, and you have yourself a healthy meal (fairly healthy if you make it into pie…). This is a great one to make for your housemates – this was very popular with mine – or scale it down to use 2 chicken breasts and eat it over two days – making sure you heat the chicken up carefully so it’s piping hot all the way through.

Ingredients – serves 4:

3-4 chicken breasts

Juice of half a lemon

30g butter

Approx. 200g of mushrooms (2/3rds of an average supermarket pack) - sliced

1 leek – finely sliced

30g flour

300ml chicken stock (use a whole chicken stock cube dissolved in 600ml of boiling water)

*Optional bacon if you have it

Parsley if you have it

If you’re making it into a pie – half a block of ready-made puff pastry.

Put the chicken breasts in a dish, drizzle with olive oil, squeeze the juice of half a lemon over them and season with salt and pepper. Cook them in the oven at 190 degrees, gas mark 5 for 35-40 minutes – or until the juices run clear**.

With 10-15 minutes left to go on the timer, put the kettle on and make your stock. Meanwhile, melt the butter in a saucepan on a medium-low heat and fry the leek until it’s starting to go soft (*add bacon cut into pieces at this point too if you’re using it). Add the mushrooms and continue to fry until they’re soft too. Don’t worry if there’s excess butter – this is what makes the sauce.

Once the leek and mushrooms are soft, add the flour and stir until it’s soaked up the butter. Then start adding the stock – stirring continuously. It may go lumpy at first but persevere and it should come together and start to thicken. Keep adding the stock until it’s the right consistency. At this point if you’re feeling clever – get the chicken out and tip the juices from the dish into the sauce, then put the chicken back in the oven to carry on cooking.

Taste your sauce and season it. At this point I add parsley if I have it, salt, pepper, maybe some mixed herbs, a little more lemon juice if it needs it – whatever floats your boat! Once the chicken is done, cut it up into chunks and mix it in with the sauce.

You can serve it with wholegrain rice and vegetables and you’re away! 
OR
Make it into pie…

Transfer the chicken and sauce into a fairly deep dish, roll out the pastry to roughly 3mm thick and place it over the chicken. Make sure to make a small hole in the top of the pastry, and then cook for a further 20 minutes until the pastry is brown.

ALL THE YUMMY PIE

**(to test this, poke the chicken breast with a knife and then press down on it with the flat side of the knife. There should be no pink colouration in the juice that comes out. Alternatively chop the breast in half and check it’s not pink – you’re going to cut it all up anyway).

Tune of the day: Don't Give Up (On Love)- Blinkie - It's cold, it's wet, it's miserable, so listen to the electronic charms of Blinkie, and reach for a saucepan rather than those Dominoes 2-for-1 offers.

Tip of the day: there are so many really good videos on YouTube showing you how to make many amazing, healthy recipes. I personally love Jamie Oliver’s Food Tube - he invites lots of other chefs as guests to his channel and has so much variation. Also Donal Skehan.    

Veggie Frittata

It's been a while! The end of summer always gets a bit hectic - making sure you see all the friends and family you can before you go to uni. Anyway, here's a recipe that will you set you up nicely for a day of fresher's. Frittatas are similar to omelettes, but this one is made in the oven as it uses roasted vegetables - I've taken inspiration from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's Veg Everyday book here.

Eggs are cheap and valuable sources of protein. Try and buy free-range if you can, think of the poor chicken!

We're now moving on to autumn and winter vegetables - sticking with the old seasonal veg, so basically use whatever you have in your fridge at the time. Sticking with the general rule of the harder the raw veg, the longer it will need to roast. In this case, cut the harder ones up smaller so they roast more quickly.

Ingredients: This will serve two or three people, or one then cold for lunch another day!

• 300g (roughly) of vegetables - root veg are probably better in this case, so sweet potato, butternut squash, carrots, parsnips, potatoes,. Courgettes and peppers will also work as will celery, but don't cut them up so small. The others should be cut into roughly 2-3cm cubes as an idea.
• 1/2 an onion - red is probably nicer here, also cut into slices/cubes.
• 3 dessert spoons of olive oil
• A handful of herbs if you have them - fresh parsley, thyme, chives etc.
• 3-4 eggs more if you end up having more vegetables.
• About 10-15g of hard cheese (parmesan, cheddar etc), grated.

All that colourful veg

Recipe:

• Preheat the oven to 190 degrees (Gas 5).
• Prepare your veg - peel the carrots, parsnip etc. cut the skin off the butternut squash, chop and chunk it all!
• Place them in a roasting dish - baking tray, glass or ceramic dish - whatever you have that fits all the veg so they're in roughly one layer.

Couldn't rotate it - but you get the even-layered veg idea...

• Toss them in olive oil and season well with salt and pepper then roast in the oven for 40 minutes, giving them a stir halfway through and adding mushrooms if you fancy.
• 30 minutes in, if you want to serve your frittata with roasted tomatoes (a good combination I promise), place two in a small dish and drizzle a little oil over them. Cut a slit in the top of each and place some fresh basil on top. Bung them in the oven and they'll be done at the same time as everything else. 
• When the veg is nearly done, beat the eggs, chopped herbs and more salt and pepper in a bowl and when the 40 minutes is up (or the veg is soft and looks done), pour the mixture into the roasting dish and wiggle until it's all evenly distributed. 

Whisky whisky (check out that colour coordination)

• Scatter the grated cheese on top, and put it back in the oven for 10-15 minutes, until the egg is set and it's looking golden brown round the edges. With 5 minutes to go, put some peas on to boil if you fancy - add some green to the plate!

Scattering cheese after pouring in egg

You could eat this with a chunk of wholemeal bread, or put potatoes in it for carbs. You could also have it with jacket potato. The beauty of a frittata, is that you can eat it cold the next day for lunch - just put it in the fridge wrapped in clingfilm when it's completely cool.

The finished thing in all its puffy golden glory - yum yum.

Complimentary Tune: Fleet Foxes - Mykonos (I know it's old but I love it)

Tip of the day: Fresher's week is coming up for a lot of people, and if you're moving in to new accommodation and meeting new flatmates - one of the most important tips I can give you is prop your door open and get to know your flatmates and talk to them. They might end up being your best friends or they might not, but either way you'll appreciate having people to go out with and do stuff during the day in freshers week before you meet other people in your clubs or course.

---K