To celebrate Great British Beef Week, I’ve joined up with Eversfield Organic to create this super delicious and very easy steak and ale pie. As you know, I’m passionate about eating organic and when it comes to meat, I strongly feel that we should be buying the best quality we can afford to ensure as high animal welfare standards as possible. Whilst it’s not proven, I also definitely think that organic food tastes better.
Eversfield Organic is a family run farm in Devon, selling their produce online and through their farm shops. I recently tried their ‘Friday night in box‘ which included rump steaks straight from heaven; tender, juicy and full of flavour. Obviously, after those, I knew that their braising steak would be good too. Mark and his family work with the Rare Breeds Survival Trust, rearing their own herd of native Aberdeen Angus cattle. Read more about them, and how important organic, grass-fed meat is to their ethos and practice in this blog post about Great British Beef Week.
Great British Beef Week
This year, ‘GBBW’ is focused on sustainability and the ethical side of beef farming. I think when it comes to eating sustainably, beef might not be the first thing to come to mind but actually, British beef is raised in a much more sustainable way than elsewhere around the world. In fact, Jilly Greed, founder of Ladies in Beef, one half of the group behind GBBW has said that “British beef production boasts a carbon footprint of just less than half the global average, and reflects the hugely important and positive work our farmers are putting in day-by-day,”.
My easy steak and ale pie recipe
Serves 2 hungry people or 4 with lots of sides!
Ingredients:
- 500g braising steak, cut into 1cm chunks
- 500g ready made puff pastry (come on… who makes their own??)
- x1 large onion, thickly sliced
- Salted butter
- 500ml bottle of ale
- 200ml beef stock
- x2 minced garlic cloves
- 1 egg lightly whisked with a fork
- Fresh thyme
- x2 bay leaves
- 1 tsp cornflour mixed with 2 tsp water
- Olive oil
Method:
- Start by cooking the onions and garlic in a dash of olive oil and a knob of butter. Cook slowly for 10 minutes until softened but not browned. Remove from the pan.
- Coat the beef in seasoned flour. Add a little more oil to the pan (if needed), turn the heat up and fry the beef in batches to brown it all over. Remove from the pan.
- Keeping the heat high, start to pour the ale into the pan, using a wooden spoon to loosen any charry bits. Pour the whole bottle in, add the stock and bring to the boil.
- Once boiling, add the beef, herbs and salt and pepper to the pan and turn the heat right down to low. Add a lid and leave to cook slowly for 1 hour.
- After an hour, remove the lid and cook for a further 30 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 180c / fan 160c / gas mark 4
- Remove the pan from the heat, add the cornflour paste to thicken and pour into your pie dish, along with the onions.
- Roll out the pastry on a floured surface. You want it around 0.5-1cm thick and big enough to drape across the top of the dish.
- Egg wash the edges of your dish and cut a thin strip(s) to wrap around it. The pastry will be held in place by the egg.
- Place the ‘lid’ onto the dish, touching the edging strip the whole way around. Cut off the excess hanging pastry and then use a fork or crimping technique (I’m not fancy enough) to seal the edges around.
- Egg wash the top of the pastry.
- Cook in the oven for 30-35 min until the pastry has puffed up and the top is golden brown.
We ate our pie with creamy mash and green beans, served with thick beefy gravy. A perfect Sunday roast alternative or just a bit of a mid week treat! This is a really easy steak and ale pie to make, don’t let all the steps put you off. Give it a try!
*Eversfield Organic sent me the ingredients for this pie in return for a blog post and recipe. I was not paid and the words are all my own.*
