Savoury Minced Meat Pie

This is not like the minced meat pie served at American tables for holidays (such as Thanksgiving) which are sweet and have the yucky little raisins in them. I had the most delicious and savoury piece of minced meat pie that I had ever eaten in my life in a London pub back in 1987. I remember that it was fairly simple, the filling consisting of ground beef, minced onion, mushrooms, brown gravy and not much more (I really wish I would have thought to ask what was in it)! Using common sense, I think I have well and truly recreated that pie from memory in this recipe which is every bit as delicious as that London pub pie was!

Ingredients:

1½ lbs. ground beef (use ground round or chuck)
2-3 cloves garlic, minced or crushed
1 lg. onion, finely chopped
1 can Campbell's condensed Golden Mushroom soup
4 Tbs. liquid beef bouillon - or - 2 Tbs. HP Sauce
2 Tbs. Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp. salt, 1 tsp. ground black pepper
9" pie crust, top and bottom (see notes below)
a few drops of cooking oil (make it healthy corn, soy, canola, safflower or olive oil)

Preparation:

Brown the onions and garlic in a large skillet until caramelized over medium-high heat in a little oil. Add beef and brown with the caramelized onions, crumbling thoroughly and draining fat. Add spices, sauces and soup; simmer mixture over medium-low heat about six to ten minutes, until thoroughly warmed through. Place your first pie shell in a compatibly-sized pie tin or glass pie baking dish, and transfer the warmed mixture into it; cover with a second pie shell, trim edges neatly of excess dough with a knife and pinch edges together to seal in the meat filling. Brush the top of the pie shell with a little oil so it browns nicely in the oven, and cut four or five small, decorative slits in the top so the pie can vent as it bakes. Bake in a pre-heated oven at 400 degrees F. for approximately 30 minutes, or until the crust is golden. Serves 6 - 8.

Notes:
If you don't have the time (or skill) to make pie crust from scratch, ready-made pie shells are sold in in most American super markets. Pillsbury produces packages with two 9" ready-made all-purpose pie shells which are commonly available in the grocer's refrigerated section in cardboard boxes (the crust doughs are sold two per package, and you just unfold/unroll them, press one down in your pie pan, and put the other over the top, trimming the edges and pinching together nicely). Sometimes you'll find two pie crusts produced by various other companies in aluminum pans sold together in the market's frozen section; you just thaw the second pie crust, remove it from the tin and place it over the first, pinching the edges together to seal the pie with a crust top. It's EASY!

Try making "London Pub" pasties, too!

For a tasty variation, cut the ingredients for the mixture in half and, using 3/4 lb. of ground beef and only half the can of soup, you can make a couple of the world's best pasties out of the filling and the pie pastry (see my recipe for Cornish pasties for directions on how to make pasty shells).

Me in London over 20 years (and 20 pounds) ago. My, how time does fly!


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