Savory Beef Pie
Ingredients
Scale
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 15 tbsp chilled unsalted butter
- 5 tbsp ice water
- 1 onion, chopped
- 2–3 cloves garlic, chopped
- 1 lb ground beef
- Herbs to taste
- 2–3 tomatoes, chopped
- Grated cheese
- Handful spinach, stems removed
Instructions
- In a bowl, stir together the flour and salt. Add the butter pieces and, using a pastry blender or a fork, cut in the butter until the mixture looks crumbly and the butter is in pea-sized pieces. Add the ice water and, using a wooden spoon, work in very briefly to form a rough dough. Do not make the dough a smooth, homogeneous ball. Work unincorporated flour into the dough when rolling out.
- Wrap the dough and loose flour particles in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 1 hour or for up to 1 week before use.
- Once dough is in the fridge resting, you can start getting the filling ready. Start by sauteeing onions and garlic in a medium to large pan. After the onion mix on its way cooking, add the ground beef and season with some Italian seasonings and herbs. Dried herbs are good at this point and I like to use Oregano, Basil, Thyme, and for seasonings chili flakes and fennel seed work great. Allow all these seasonings and herbs to cook in with your ground beef. Once the beef is pretty much cooked and smelling good, add 2-3 chopped tomatoes and let them become part of the sauce for the pie. Let beef mixture cool a bit.
- Roll out dough and place in a 9″ pie pan. Put cooled beef mixture into uncooked pie shell. Chop a couple handfuls of spinach and put on top of the beef. Grate and sprinkle a layer of cheese on top of the spinach. Carefully place a piece of dough over the whole pie and pinch the dough together to create a sealed pie dough shell. Make a few cuts on the top to allow for steam to vent and bake at 350′ for 45-60 minutes. If you want to get fancy make an egg wash and brush over the savory pie to give it that golden yellow pastry look.