Sous Chef

I entitled this post Porky Pies because that’s what these are (to tell a porky pie means telling a lie in Cockney rhyming slang). These are not pukka pork pies as I use pork sausage, but they are delicious..They are not hard to make, and are very economical as one packet of sausages makes 12 individual pies. My family are mad about them and I watched my son devour 4 in quick succession on Sunday!!

I know some people are wary of pastry and gelatine, but I promise that nothing in this recipe is difficult.

This is one of my Mum’s recipes that I have adapted.

Pastry

2 cups cake flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup butter

1 egg yolk

Ice cold water

Sift the cake flour, add the salt and rub in the butter – you can do this by hand but I find it easier to use the K beater on my mixer.

Rub in the butter to the flour until it resembles breadcrumbs

Mix until it resembles breadcrumbs, make a well, add the egg yolk and a little water, mix and add more water until it forms a dough. Wrap in cling and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Filling

1 pkt (6) pork sausages

375mls strong chicken stock

2 tsp gelatine

2 TSP cold water

1 tsp dried sage

1 small onion chopped

1 apple peeled and grated

Seasoning

Simmer the sausages in the chicken stock, remove, cool and keep the chicken stock for mixing with the gelatine later.

Simmer the pork sausages in the chicken stock for 15 minutes

In the meantime, fry the onions gently until translucent (not brown)

Sprinkle the gelatine onto 2 TSP cold water and leave to get spongy

Grease or spray a muffin tin

Roll our 2/3 of the pastry and line the muffin tins, use the remainder for the lids.

I normally put the tray back in the fridge for 10 minutes to firm, the colder the pastry the less it will shrink during cooking.

Remove the skins from the cooled sausages, chop and mix with the fried onion, sage, seasoning and grated apple.

Chop the sausages into small pieces

Fill the muffin cases with the pork mixture.

Fill the pastry bases with the pork mix

Cut the rounds for your tops, as you can see there is not much pastry rim to adhere to, so I brush the underside of the lid with egg wash (egg and a little milk mixed) then I crimp it together with the edge of a fork. Make a hole in the top to enable you to add the gelatine later, I use a plastic syringe I got from the pharmacy but if using a spoon make the hole a little bigger than I did.

Top the pies with lids

Brush the tops of the pies with egg wash and place in the middle of the oven for 25 minutes @ 200c (I usually egg wash them again halfway through)

Fresh out of the oven

Leaving the pies in the tray, let them cool and put in the fridge until they are cold.

Heat 125mls of the reserved chicken stock and dissolve the spongy gelatine in it, let it cool until it’s starting to thicken, using a syringe (just the plastic bit) or a spoon pour approx 8-10mls of gelatine into the cold pies. Put them back in the fridge for at least another hour for the jelly to set. Don’t be tempted to leave the jelly out, this is a much tastier jelly than you find in supermarket pork pies.

Pork pies are traditionally served cold with salad and pickles, they are also great in lunchboxes and picnics.