Chicken and Sweetcorn Pie

Oh how I love pie! Previously all my pies were made in my rather lovely and elegant granite Le Creuset pie dish. Well, that is now resigned to the depths of the dusty hallway cupboard (aka Kitchen Narnia!) as say hellloooo there to my new beauty:

I cannot honestly express to you here how much I LOVE this pie dish. Those who know me well know I have a thing for polka dots, and obviously I love baking but combine the two – and well its like Christmas has come early!!

Since being given the beauty last month for my birthday, I had been itching to christen it and finally the day came around when we had friends around for dinner, and I decided to make one of my favourites – chicken and sweetcorn pie! *I do marginally love chicken and mushroom slightly even more but as D detests them, this was the next best thing!*

The pie dish is a little deeper than my old one and I was trying to gauge how much filling to make, in all honesty it was a teeny bit under the rim but was more than enough to feed us four for dinner plus a portion for my lunchbox the next day so isn't far out!

Having been at work all day, I cheated slightly and bought ready rolled puff pastry, which as predicted worked perfectly, though you could of course make your own! I was also a bit lazy and just topped the pie, rather than doing the base as well but as it can be a bit stodgy I was glad to skip this part! Also no blind baking so much more straightforward to make!

Ingredients

5 skinless and boneless chicken thighs, trimmed and diced into ½ inch chunks
½ pint Milk
2 tsp Marigold boullion powder (or veg stock cube) made up with ½ pint boiling water
1 white Onion, finely diced
1 celery stick, sliced thinly
1x 200g tinned sweetcorn
1 Puff pastry sheet
1 tbsp olive oil
1 heaped tbsp. freshly chopped parsley
S&P to taste
2 tbsp cornflour
Egg to glaze – or my new discovery egg glaze from Lakeland!

Pre-heat the oven to 170fan/ 190 regular.

Heat the oil in a large sauté pan and soften the onion, without too much browning.

Turn up the heat slightly and brown the chicken in the pan, add a little more oil if needed, and the celery, cook for about 10 minutes or until the chicken has cooked through, add the celery, mix well and transfer to a bowl using a slotted spoon, leaving any juices in the pan.

Mix the cornflour with a little of the milk, to form a paste.

Return the pan to the heat, add the stock and milk, bring to the boil and whisk in the cornflour quickly, until the sauce has thickened, it will happen quickly! Add the reserved chicken mixture, parsley, season and transfer to the pie dish.

Brush the egdes of the pie dish with a little beaten egg (see egg notes!) and affix the pastry sheet over, pressing down firmly to seal. Glaze with the egg and make a couple of holes to allow the steam to escape and bake for approx. 25 minutes or until its all golden and puffed up nicely!

Serve with your favourite vegetables –we had sautéed cabbage and lots of lovely swede mash!