Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Vegan Pot Pie

 
I used to love chicken pot pies when I was a kid. There was just something so satisfying about the soggy crust on the bottom and the way that all the vegetables and chicken were cut into cubes. Thinking about my cubed hashbrown post a few days ago, I'm beginning to wonder if I have a thing for cubed food...hmm. Anyway, as I got older and became vegan, I kind of forgot about pot pies. But then last year one day after work my sister surprised me with a vegan pot pie with tofu. The vegetables and tofu were all cut into the same sized cubes, the crust was soggy on the bottom, but not too soggy, the top was nice and flaky. It brought me straight back to my childhood. 

These pot pies are kind of a good amount of work (which makes me appreciate my sister's surprise last year even more), but I had been craving them for quite some time. So I decided I would take advantage of the weekend and make these. It ended up being a two day process, mostly because I kept forgetting to do things, such as thawing out the tofu and refrigerating the crust. But even though there were some frustrating moments and it did take me two days, I'd do it all over again because they were just so darn tasty. Thanks to my sister for the recipe for the crust!
Vegan Pot Pie

Ingredients:

1 cup frozen peas
16 oz. frozen and thawed firm or extra firm tofu, diced in cubes
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chilled soy butter, diced into 1/2-inch cubes (best to chill the cubes in the freezer for at least 15 minutes before using)
1/2 cup shortening, chilled
3-4 tablespoons ice water

Directions

Preheat the oven to 400˚F.

Combine the flour and salt in a food processor or mixer.

Add the chilled butter cubes and pulse five times.
Add the shortening and pulse a few times until the dough is coarse (like the texture of cornmeal) with clumps of butter.
 
Add the water 1 tablespoon at a time until the dough is moist.

Chill the pastry dough in the fridge for at least an hour before rolling out. You can also make this dough the night before and chill it overnight.


Take one fourth of the dough and on a lightly floured surface roll it out to the size of your pot pie pan. Place in the bottom of the pan, prick the bottoms and sides with a fork, then cover with aluminum foil and place a few pennies, marbles, or pie weights in the bottom. Do the same for another fourth of the dough. Bake in the oven for 10-15 minutes. These will be the bottom of your two pot pies.
While the bottom of pies are baking, roll out the remaining dough for the top of the pies. They should be 2 inches longer in diameter than the width of your pot pie pans.

When the bottom of the pies are finished, take them out of the oven and turn it down to 350˚ F.  Fill the pie tins with the potato soup filling, peas, and tofu. Stir the tofu, peas, and potato soup filling so that all the ingredients are evenly distributed. Cover with the pie crust tops and cut small holes into the tops. Note: you can add mashed potatoes on top of the pies, if desired.

Bake the pot pies in a 350˚ F oven for 20 minutes, or until tops begin to turn golden brown.

Makes 2 pot pies.

vegan pot pie with mashed potatoes
vegan pot pie

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