Here's a little tutorial on a brunch we make fairly often around here. By 'we' I mean, I force Warren to cut the butter into the flour to make the pastry, about which he complains bitterly, but complies.
This particular occasion, we only put a few things into the pies, and made little ones, rather than one big one. In hindsight, I much preferred the last one-big-one we made to these little ones, but then again I put more effort into the big one... lots of sautéed leeks and semi cooked tomatoes.
Anyway, start with some flour. I use whole wheat, and I rarely measure anything. Add some salt, and some baking powder and whatever else makes you feel groovy - these got a good dose of dried chopped Rosemary, and some red pepper flakes, and lots of coarsely ground black pepper. Add enough cold butter to make it all squish together (if you don't know how to cut butter into flour to make pastry, look that shit up - too much typing to explain in this post, and I'm no expert either).
Pardon the PJ's, lazy weekend. Roll your pastry out on some parchment, and smooth it into whatever shape you desire, getting it as flat as possible.
For these ones, I sliced a nice, ripe tomato, some raw garlic, and broke an egg into each. I broke the yolk too to ensure it all ran around and didn't turn out like a hard boiled egg inside some pastry, though with the one-big-pie, I left the eggs intact inside the pie. I used loads. Wish I had pictures of that one to compare...
Fry yourself some bacon, and whatever else you want to put in them pies that won't get cooked enough just sitting in the oven (or at least, won't cook in enough time to avoid petrifying your eggs).
Assemble. (Imagine, the egg and the bacon and some S&P entering the scene after this shot...) Cover with a top piece. They look cute and professional if you use the prongs of a fork to press the edges together, but these little pies were too full to close properly, lesson learned.
I grated some pecorino on top (from
The Cheesiry before baking to make it really crispy). I usually also keep some of the egg whites aside when cracking the eggs, and brush the outside of the assembled pies, but it recently occurred to me that perhaps I'm supposed to be using the yolks? Whatever.
Bake those puppies in a hot oven (anywhere from 350C to 400C depending on how impatient you are, and how much softening your inside ingredients need) and then let cool on a rack for a while. If you let them cool without a rack for ventilating, they're get soggy and no one will be your friend. And don't worry - the insides stay hot FOREVER after they come out of the oven, so be generous on the cooling time to let the pastry mellow out.
Devour!
- Mama
