Gourmet Tuesday

Today's meal is brought to you by the letters U and K.

("Gourmet" is a bit relative for this meal. It is different than the usual, but nothing exotic.)

I decided to try a new meal. I bought the ingredients a week ago and haven't had the gumption to start it because it required making a dough. But today I finally did. It was a bit of work and I wasn't sure how good it would be because the ingredients are pretty basic: ground beef, onion, potato, salt and pepper. But it is cooking now and smells amazing!!!!

Meat and Potato Pasties (I just learned that pasty rhymes with nasty, hmm)
1 lb ground beef chuck (80-85% lean)
2 med russet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1/4 inch pieces
2 med onions, finely chopped
4 C all-purpose flour
1 1/4 C (2 1/2 sticks) cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces


~Heat oven to 350. In large bowl, combine beef, potatoes, onions, 1t salt and 1/4 t pepper.
~Put flour, butter and 1t salt in large bowl. With pastry blender or 2 knives, cut in butter, working until mixture resembles coarse meal, with a few pea sized lumps remaining. Add 2/3C ice water; mix with fork and work with hands until dough forms. If still crumbly, add more ice water, 1T at a time (up to 4 more T). Do not overwork. Shape dough into 4 small disks and let rest for 10 minutes.
~On lightly floured surface, roll each disk into 10-inch circle.
~Divide beef mixture among circles of dough, shaping meat into a small loaf. Gather and pull up the sides of the dough around the filling, pressing edges together to form a seam on top. Using fingers, crimp the seam. Transfer pasties to parchment lined baking sheet. Bake until golden brown, 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours.


I've heard of pasties before, but never had one. The picture looked really good, and it is originally a British meal and I love all things from across the pond. It looked like something Jim would enjoy, too, so we tried it.

It was good. A bit dry and bland, but that could partially be due to some error on my part. I also put in less salt than the recipe says because I usually cut back on salt. Ended up doing something very uncharacteristic of me and salted it on my plate! I don't like beer, but this tasted good with a little bit of beer. Would have been nice with gravy and Kiah put some ketchup on his. Jim hit it on the head when he said it tasted very old world and homey. It was definitely a simple, straightforward tasting meal. And it left us very full!

Close up of the pasties.