My mother, Shirley, was a pie master. She could mix up crust for a double-crust pie in a matter of seconds. It was always the same recipe: 2 cups all-purpose flour mixed with 1 teaspoon salt and 2 tablespoons granulated sugar (sugar if she was making a sweet pie); 2/3 cup Crisco; and 3-4 tablespoons ice-cold water. Her’s was always perfect. Perfectly flavored, perfectly crimped, and perfectly browned. Mom didn’t make savory pies often, but this recipe was one of our favorites.

Three reasons why you should bake up this delicious ground beef pot pie and keep it in your recipe box:

• This isn’t a store-bought frozen one heated up in the oven. It’s one you make and bake with all the love I know you put into every dish.
• Shirley’s Ground Beef Pot Pie is quick and soooo easy to prepare and is inexpensive to make.
• Everyone LOVES pot pies!

 

What makes this pot pie so easy?

Except for the browned ground beef, you can make this entirely with pre-made ingredients.

All pot pies need a crust. I like to buy pre-made pie crusts from the grocery because I lack my mother’s skill. I store them in the freezer until I want to make any sort of pie. Of course, you can make your own crust – good for you! But having pre-made ones at the ready is a real time-saver. I find boxes of double pre-made pie crusts in the grocery refrigerator section for $1.79 – that’s a pretty economical time-saver and perfect for savory or sweet pie applications. Or you might try building the crust out of phyllo sheets like this Chicken Pot Pie in Phyllo Crust.

For this pot pie recipe, I cubed fresh carrots and potatoes and completed the filling with frozen peas. But you can substitute frozen carrots and peas – you know the combo bags sold in grocery store freezer sections. And cubed frozen hash brown potatoes – another staple in my freezer. And for a real simple prep, you can use frozen chopped onions for those days you just don’t feel like chopping an onion. I periodically have those days.

 

I am not a big fan of canned vegetables. Frozen is the way to go for me if I’m not using fresh veggies.

Frozen vegetables taste fresher and maintain a crunch, although not as perfect as fresh vegetables but better than canned. I know canned vegetables are less expensive than frozen. Please consider this – when you drain off the canning fluid from canned vegetables, what are you left with? A 15oz can of vegetables yields less than a 12oz package of frozen vegetables. And then there’s the added salt in canned vegetables that I try to avoid at all costs for health reasons.

 

 

 

Add one Tablespoon olive oil in a 12″ skillet over medium-high heat. Brown 1½ – 2 pounds of ground beef or ground turkey. Once the meat is browned, drain off the fat in a colander and set aside.

Return the skillet to the cooktop. Add one tablespoon olive oil and heat over medium-high heat. Add chopped onion and diced carrots, stir, and quickly saute until the onions become translucent.

Add diced potatoes and minced garlic. Stir and cook for one minute. Add 3/4 cup of beef stock. Stir scraping up the brown bits at the bottom of the skillet.

Turn the heat down to medium-low. Put a lid on the skillet and steam the vegetables for 10 minutes.

While the veggies are steaming, it’s time to get the pie crust ready. If you’re using packaged, it’s just a matter of bringing the crusts to room temperature. Even though pre-made crusts are 9″ in diameter, I like to roll mine out to make them a bit larger and thinner. If you’ve decided to make your own crust, you should follow your recipe and refrigerate for 30 minutes before rolling. I’d make the crust before starting the recipe so your crust has time to rest.

Fit pie crust into a 9″ deep-dish pie pan. Return to the cooktop, remove the lid from the skillet, and add the cooked ground beef and frozen peas. Stir until combined and spoon the ground beef filling into the crust. Roll out a crust for the top and put it on top of the filling.

Next, crimp the edges to seal both crust layers and cut slits over the top crust. Mix one egg with one tablespoon water and whisk with a fork to make an egg wash. Brush the egg wash over the top of the pie. At this point, you can sprinkle the top of your pie with flaky salt and/or coarsely ground black pepper.

Pop your pot pie into a pre-heated 425°F oven. Bake for 30 minutes or until the crust is flaky and nicely browned. Remove to a cooling rack and allow to rest for 10 minutes before serving.

While the pie is resting, you can whip together a quick and simple brown gravy to ladle over the hot pot pie slices.

• In the same skillet you used to prepare the vegetables and over medium heat melt 2 tablespoons butter. Add 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour. Whisk until combined which forms a roux.
• Add 2 cups of warmed beef broth. Whisk until combined.
• Continue to cook and lightly whisk for a few minutes until the sauce begins to thicken. Check the seasoning – add salt and pepper if needed. You may want to add dried herbs to the sauce to kick the flavor up a notch.

And there you have it! A nice green salad or a bowl of fresh fruit would go well with your extremely flaky and delicious beef pot pie.

Please Note: There is no binder in the meat pie filling. Part of this is because adding more liquid to the filling can make the bottom crust soggy. I like the ground beef pot pie to be dryer with a flaky crust. That’s why I suggested making a side beef gravy. However, you might add one cup of shredded cheese just before spooning the filling into the pie crust. You can even make the pot pie Southwestern by adding a can of drained chopped chilies and shredded Monterey Jack cheese to the filling, too, served with a lovely salsa with shredded lettuce, sour cream and/or guacamole. It’s really up to you.