Steak (and Kidney) Pie

Okay, when my mom makes this, she adapts it from a recipe called "Beef Pie with Herbs" from her 1961 edition of The New York Times Cookbook. What follows is more an outline of a process rather than a specific recipe. You can alter it to suit your own tastes, like my mom does; that is, after all, the point.

Kidney is in parentheses because in the US it can be hard to find kidney, and anyway many American's won't eat it for some reason. Therefore you can sub more steak in for the kidney, but I think you'd be missing out. It would still be tasty, though.

Steak (and Kidney) Pie

Ingredients

• 1/4 cup flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1 pound boneless chuck or steak cut into 1 inch cubes
• Enough oil to brown the meat
• 1/2 cup chopped onion
• 1 or 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 cups liquid such as red wine, water, good beer, or beef stock
• bay leaf
• chopped fresh or equivalent dried herbs of your choice, to taste. Mom uses thyme, parsley, and marjoram. I use the same, sometimes with a pinch of basil. If chopped fresh, should come to about 1/4 - 1/3 cup. This is necessarily inexact!
• 1 1/2 cups peeled and cubed potatoes
• 1 1/2 to 2 cups other vegetative edibles such as mushrooms, carrots, pearl onions... whatever is needing to be used up in the fridge, basically.
• Pastry for a single-crust pie

Directions

1. Mix flour, salt and pepper. Dredge the meat in the seasoned flour to coat. Heat the oil in a large pan and brown the meat on all sides.
2. Add the onion and garlic and sauté for five minutes. Stir in the remaining seasoned flour. Add liquid. Cook, stirring, until thickened.
3. Add bay leaf, herbs, potatoes, and herbs. Cover the pan and simmer over low heat until the meat is tender, about half an hour to 45 minutes. Allow the mixture to cool until lukewarm.
4. At this point you can refrigerate the filling overnight and assemble the pie tomorrow. This will save you time and allow the flavors to come out more.
5. Preheat oven to 425°. This is a good time to roll out the dough.
6. Turn the mixture into a one-and-a-half quart casserole and top with the pastry. Flute or crimp the edge and cut slashes in the top for steam. Bake 25 minutes to half an hour, until done.

This is especially good with the Ginger Candied Carrots.