Pasties
You can make pasties one of several
ways. The first step is to decide if you want to make individual
ones or a big one like a pie.
For individual ones, you will need
one pie crust per pastie. For a big one, you will need two, one for
the bottom crust and one for the top. They need to be big enough to
fit your pie plate.
I like to have all the filling parts
ready before I make the pie crust, so if you peel your potatoes, keep them
covered with water but not for too long or it will affect how they
cook. (If you keep them in water without cooking for too long,
they'll turn very starchy when cooked.)
Peel and slice your potatoes.
One or two per individual pastie, enough to fill the pie plate if a big
one. You could dice them if you like them cut that way. I like
the slices because they're easier to layer.
I tend to use cut up beef (stew
meat, London broil or other cut comparable) rather than ground meat, so
that would be the next thing to do. You could use lamb or other meat
-- I've never had them using chicken but why not? You don't need a
lot of meat. Remember, our ancestors did not eat the huge amounts of
meat that we do!! And one of the purposes of the pastie was to make
what meat they had go further. Nutritionists say that a meat serving
should be no bigger than a deck of cards so this is a good rule to
follow. For an individual pastie, I use about 5-6 pieces - sometimes
less, sometimes more, depending on how big I make the individual ones and
how big I've cut the meat. For a big pie pastie, I'd say you want
about a pound for two - pies.
Cut up some onions. However
you like them cut is fine. In other words, it doesn't matter if you
slice them in rings or dice them. I like to sauté them first
because then they hold their flavor without becoming overpowering to the
crust, potatoes or meat.
Some folks like to mix the potatoes,
meat and onions all together and season with salt & pepper or add some
other herbs. If you do this, then you spoon the mixture into the
pastie. Make your pie crust
-- or you can use ready-made crust. My favorite pie crust is this:
1 cup flour per crust
pinch of salt
1/3 cup shortening or lard
1 egg
1 teaspoon vinegar
very cold water Cut the shortening into the
flour so that the bits are pea-sized. In a measuring cup put one
egg. Add the vinegar to the egg. Add enough very cold water to
make 1/3 cup of liquid. This is enough liquid for two crust.
Add about half the liquid to the flour/shortening mixture. Mix it
together and you will be able to see if you need more by the
texture. If it looks dry and not all the flour/shortening mixture
lumps together, add a little more of the liquid. If it's too wet
(more like cookie dough than pie dough), add a little flour. Don't
handle the dough a lot or it will toughen. If you want, you can let
the dough rest a little. Then divide the dough into as many balls of
dough as you have decided to use for your crust. Roll each one out
to about 1/4" thickness. I like to make my crust two at a time;
otherwise it seems thy never turn out as well if I make 4 or 6 at a time. If
you are doing a pie-type pastie, do the bottom crust and then layer the
potatoes, meat and some onions in the pie plate. Fill up the pie
plate with these layers. Then put the top crust on. Put it in
the oven and let it bake for about an hour at 350 degrees F. You'll know
they're done when you stick a for into the cooked pastie and you can feel
that the potatoes have cooked. If you're
doing individual pasties, roll out the dough for one crust. Make it
as close to a circle as you can get and about an inch bigger than the
diameter of a pie plate -- you can vary the size if you like but make sure
the dough is rolled out into a circle. I like to take a butter knife
and make a light line down the middle of the circle. Then to either
the right or left of the line, lay out some potato slices, add your meat
cubes or bits and some onion, then do the layering all over again.
You want to put enough on that half-circle without overstuffing the
pastie. When you're done and you'll know by a little experimentation
about how much to put on it, take the empty circle half and draw it over
the full half. Use a little water to help seal the edge of the
pastie. Crimp the edges together. You can make some fancy
slits in the top of the crust if you like or just poke a fork to make some
holes. You can brush the tops with some milk if you like.
Bake them in the oven for about an hour at 350 degrees F. Again,
test for doneness with a fork or clean broom straw. You
can put some aluminum foil around the edges to keep the crust from
burning.
You can parboil the potatoes in some beef broth or bullion (very salty)
prior to layering so the are partially cooked but not too soft to
layer. If you do this, you'll want to let them cool a bit before
trying to handle them.
You can partially cook the meat before layering and then spoon baits of it
into the big pastie or individual ones. You
can freeze the finished pasties. The individual ones can be reheated
in the mircowave. They make a wonderful
quick dinner, especially as making them is quite a project. I like
to make at least 4 at a time so that I have some on hand. It's not
much more time to make more than a couple and on those nights when you
don't feel like cooking, it will feed your heart and soul just as much as
your body to have a pastie you've taken out of the freezer! They
take time to make and are a labor of love and honor to our ancestors which
is what I think about when I'm making them. Beth
Phillips Brown |
