Chicken and vegetable pot pie - Gluten free

One of the things that you miss when you go gluten free is pastry, all types, but more especially the comforting dish that is the pie. Gluten free pastry can be very disappointing, its often hard and has little or no flavour, so I was pleased to discover a promising gluten free recipe on the BBC good food website, I decided I would combine this with a traditional creamy chicken and vegetable filling for my first foray into gluten free pastry.

Reader, I am pleased to report that the resultant pie was absolutely delicious and I would definitely make the pastry again, it was sort of a shortcrust meets suet crust type of pie crust, very savoury and very very moreish. Frankly if I didn't know it was gluten free you really couldn't tell, so this would be a great recipe for a family meal.

What you need

• 175g gluten free flour
• 85g coarsely grated chilled butter
• 50g grated mature cheddar cheese
• 1 tsp coarse mustard
• 3 tbsp cold water to bind

The pie filling

• Cooked shredded chicken
• Onion - finely sliced
• Couple of carrots - peeled and chopped into small cubes
• Frozen peas
• Mushrooms - 4 or 5 finely chopped
• Chicken stock 
• Slaked cornflour to thicken
• Fresh herbs
• Salt and pepper
• Double cream or creme fraiche
• Butter or oil

What you do

• To make the pastry mix together all the pastry ingredients except the water with a fork, add the water and combine to make a dough
• Once formed into a ball, wrap in cling film and leave to rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.
• Meanwhile make your pie filling, Cook off in a tiny amount of oil or butter the onion until starting to softenened, now add the rest of the vegetables and cook for a few minutes until again softenening, now add the chicken and the herbs, followed by enough chicken stock just to cover the mixture in the pan.
• Simmer until the vegetables are tender, add the herbs and slaked cornflour to thicken the sauce. Add a dollop of creme fraiche and taste for seasoning.
• Allow to cool and place in pie dish.

• Once cool, we are ready to top with the pastry. Roll out the pastry between two pieces of clingfilm until you have a piece of pastry large enough to cover your pie dish , remove the top piece of cling film and flip the pastry piece on top of the pie dish. Remove the other piece of cling film and make a couple of holes in the pastry top.
• Brush the pastry with a little milk or beaten egg. 

• Bake for 30 - 35 minutes at 180c until golden.