Aussie Meat Pies

Gluten free - dairy free – refined sugar free – nut free - can be egg free
This one dates back to 2013 on a weekend I had the rare pleasure of having just one of my sons home for a few hours while hubby was out with our other son. I am so grateful that my kids love to cook, and I asked Mr 10 if he would like to choose something that we could make together that morning. It didn't take him long to decide he wanted to make home made ' Party Pies' and Creme Brulee.  I was pretty happy with that! We went searching the internet for ideas for how to make the best filling for a good ol' Aussie Meat Pie, and settled on this one from the blog of Katie Two Names. It sounded really good, and it didn't disappoint! I would have been happy to eat a whole meal of the meat filling by itself! We made very few changes to her original recipe, other than the fact that we used gluten free pastry.  

    Our pies turned out a little larger than a standard 'party pie' and smaller than a regular meat pie, as we used muffin tins to bake them in. You can make your pies any size you like, really.
     As for the pastry, we used a store-bought, pre-made gluten free puff pastry that was pretty decent.  If you want to make your own pastry, I have made many a lovely pie using this shortcrust pastry recipe (you will need to double it for this recipe).

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons cooking oil (I use coconut oil)

• 1 large onion, finely chopped

• 1 medium carrot, finely chopped

• 12 button mushrooms, finely chopped

• 500g organic beef mince

• 6 cloves garlic, finely chopped or minced
• 1 tablespoon tomato paste
• 2 tablespoons (gluten free) Worcestershire sauce
• 2 tablespoons tamari (wheat free soy sauce)
• 1 tablespoon mustard (dijon or wholegrain)
• 1 tablespoon gf corn flour (tapicoa or arrowroot starch will also work)
• 1 1/2 cups (gluten free) chicken or beef stock  
• 1 packet Gluten free (or other) puff pastry or a double quantity of this pastry.
• 1 egg or egg white, lightly beaten, for brushing the pastry lids (if you can't eat egg, use milk)

• butter or margarine or oil spray to grease the pie tins

Method

• Heat the oil in a large frying pan then cook the onion, carrot and mushrooms until slightly soft.
• Add the mince meat and garlic and cook, stirring and breaking up the mince, until all the mince is browned.
• Add the tomato paste, Worcestershire, mustard and tamari and stir til combined.
• Sprinkle the flour over the top and stir quickly until incorporated.
• Add the stock, stir til combined and simmer with a lid on the pan for 20-30 minutes. Stir occasionally. It is done when the meat is still nice and moist but there is no liquid still simmering in the pan.
• Cool the meat to room temperature (if you put it in the pastry casings hot, it will cause the pastry to go soggy).

• While the meat is cooling, preheat your oven to 200 degrees Celsius.
• Choose your desired size of pie tin. I used a 12 hole muffin tin, with 7cm (3 3/4) inch diameter holes. You can use one large family sized flan / pie dish or even smaller muffin tins for a 'party pie' size.
• Grease your pie tins thoroughly.
• If using packet gluten free pastry, roll out your pastry to nearly double the size of the original sheet. If using home made pastry, roll it out to about 3mm thick.
• Cut out circles that will be big enough to have a 1cm overhang above the edge of the pie hole (for my 7cm diameter pie holes I used a 12cm [5 inch] diameter bowl as my circle template). Gently fit these circles into the pie holes, ensuring you gently push the pastry right into the bottom.
• Pre-cut your circles for your lids. I used a 9cm  (3 1/2 inch) ramekin as my circle template.
• Once meat is cool, spoon into pastry cases and place pastry lids on top. Pinch the overhang of the lid together with the overhang of the bottom shell, so they are tightly stuck together.
• Lightly brush the lids with your beaten egg. Make a little slit in the top of the lid to let steam escape.
• Bake for 25-30 minutes until they are golden and the filling is hot (test by inserting a knife and feeling the temperature of the knife when you pull it out).
• Serve with a generous helping of Aussie tomato sauce.