My(dining) Space

The Columbus Dispatch had an article in today's issue about food bloggers. Check it out here:

http://www.dispatchkitchen.com/?story=dispatch/2007/12/26/20071226-E1-00.html

It's been a busy last few weeks, but I have about five recipes worth of posts waiting for me to write! Stay tuned.

Chicken Pot Pie

After a busy week and weekend, I felt like cooking something homemade on Sunday. I decided to make this chicken pot pie recipe that I'd found online awhile ago and had been wanting to try. It was really tasty and pretty easy. If I make it again I will use a little less onion. I should know by now to err on the side of too little onion. It just tends to overpower the other flavors for me.

Here's the recipe:

1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cubed
1 cup sliced carrots
1 cup frozen green peas
1 cup diced potatoes
1/3 cup butter
1/3 cup chopped onion
1/3 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/4 teaspoon garlic salt
1/2 teaspoon poultry seasoning
1-3/4 cups chicken broth
2/3 cup milk
2 (9 inch) refrigerated pie crusts

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
2. In a saucepan, combine broth, chicken, carrots, peas, and potatoes. Boil for 15 minutes. Remove cooked chicken and vegetables with a slotted spoon and set aside.
3. In another saucepan over medium heat, cook onions in butter until soft and translucent. Stir in flour, salt, pepper, garlic salt, and poultry seasoning. Slowly stir in chicken broth and milk. Simmer over medium-low heat until thick. Remove from heat and set aside.
4. Place the chicken mixture in bottom pie crust. Pour hot liquid mixture over. Cover with top crust, seal edges, and cut away excess dough. Make several small slits in the top to allow steam to escape. (I tried to be fancy and use my mini cutters, but should have made a few more cutouts closer to the edges because the crust ended up splitting there anyway.)
5. Bake in preheated oven for 30 to 35 minutes, or until pastry is golden brown and filling is bubbly. Cool for 10 minutes before serving.

Okay I have to admit something embarrassing now. I actually planned to make this recipe a month or two ago, and purchased all of the ingredients. But the thing is, the recipe didn't specify 'refrigerated' pie crusts (I added that detail). It just said "2 (9 inch) pie crusts" and I actually didn't know there was such a thing as refrigerated pie crusts. I had only ever heard of the frozen kind (the ones that come in the foil pan). So I bought those and put them in the fridge to defrost. I have to admit I was really confused about how I was going to use the second pie crust (that was already shaped in the bottom of the foil pan) as the top. When it was time to make the recipe I realized there was no way it was going to work and that there had to be some other kind of pie crusts I didn't know about. So I googled it and realized my mistake. The refrigerated kind are made by Pillsbury and are found with the refrigerated crescent rolls, cinnamon rolls, etc. I don't know how I hadn't noticed them before. But those bad boys are expensive. At my grocery store they were actually on sale for 2 packages (of 2 crusts each) for $10. So right there the pot pie costs at least $5. We were able to be somewhat frugal though, because Jason and I also ate the leftovers for lunch the next day.

Edited to add: the other day at Giant Eagle I noticed the pie crusts were on sale for 2 packages for $4. So... I must have been confused about the price when I posted previously!

for Aunt Nancy

Aunt Nancy, I stumbled across this blog today and thought you would love it:

http://sopressata.blogspot.com/

She's also a 28-year-old woman named Heather living in Columbus (interesting...), but she's much more adventurous and has beautiful photographs!