Ornate Jerusalem artichoke pie all ready for the oven

I got up today and thought, “I want to make pie”. Sitting down with my morning coffee I checked my emails. There was one from Borough Market. In it was a recipe for Jerusalem artichoke pie. I guess it was meant to be. And so, today is pie day.

Jerusalem artichokes—aka fartichokes—are knobbly little tubers; the root of a type of sunflower apparently. Eat some and chances are you’ll soon be playing a l’il melody from your own back-passage tuba. Despite being fugly they’re very delicious, luxurious even—earthy, nutty, kinda sweet almost. Roasted with the skin on. Yum. Or caramelised in butter. Oh boy! They make one of the most wonderful purées.

I changed the original recipe a bit. For me, a pie has to have shortcrust pastry. And be fully encased. I didn’t have chestnut mushrooms so I used chestnuts instead. I think both would be great though. I also added Brussels sprouts and not just for the extra puff, if you get my drift. It felt right to include sprouts with their savoury nuttiness to celebrate our Winter seasonal produce.

There were a couple of things I did with my pie that I would now change. I kept the skins on the artichokes but really there was no benefit in doing so given the artichokes were par-boiled. I also cut the artichokes into biggish chunks to match the size of whole chestnuts. But when I cut the pie artichoke boulders sometimes spilled out. I’d like a slice of pie to hold its filling in place please. So peel the artichokes and slice them. I would maybe make artichoke crisps with the skins and use as a garnish. The recipe below reflects these changes.

Skip over the recipe for a few final thoughts.

Ingredients

Serves 8.

shortcrust pastry:

400g plain flour
10g fine salt
200g butter
2 eggs
20ml ice-cold water
1 egg, whisked with a small pinch of salt for egg wash

filling:

500g Jerusalem artichokes, peeled and sliced about 5-6mm thick
300ml chicken stock
200g Brussels sprouts; remove the outer leaves and any discolourations
1tbsp butter
1tbsp plain flour
4 rashers of smoked bacon, sliced into lardons
1 large bay leaf
1 white onion, sliced
2 leeks, cleaned and chopped into 4cm lengths
2 sprigs of thyme
1 clove of garlic, germ removed then minced
Optionally, 100g chestnut mushrooms, sliced
100ml white wine
15ml double cream
1tbsp Dijon mustard
25g parmesan
180g vacuum-packed chestnuts, cut into quarters

Instructions

MAKE THE PASTRY:

BTW Make your life easier. Chill everything—the flour, butter, eggs, the bowls, your hands, the kitchen sink, the cat, the wife’s hair crimpers. Cold is your friend.

1. Very lightly butter the base and sides of a 24cm cake tin and put it in the fridge. I used one with sides separated from the base via a clasp.

2. Sieve the flour and salt into a bowl.

3. Cut cold butter into cubes then crumb the butter and flour between your fingers and thumbs. Work quickly so the butter doesn’t get too warm.

4. Gently whisk the 2 eggs and pour into the crumb along with the iced water. Using a plastic scraper, chop the mix repeatedly to combine the ingredients. This prevents overworking the dough.

5. Turn out onto a surface and bring together. Stretch the dough 3 to 5 times to make uniform. Create a ball, flatten, and wrap tightly in clingfilm. Rest in the fridge for 30 to 60 minutes.

MAKE THE PIE FILLING:

1. Gently par-boil the Jerusalem artichokes in the chicken stock for about 12 minutes then turn off the heat and allow them to cool in the stock.

2. Bring salted water to the boil. Gently drop in the Brussels sprouts and reduce the heat to a simmer. When al dente, refresh in iced water then drain. Cut into quarters.

3. Make a blonde roux. Melt the butter then stir in the flour until fully combined into a paste. Continue stirring for 4 minutes over a medium heat until a blonde colour is achieved. The paste may become sandy in texture. Leave to cool.

4. Fry the lardons on a low heat. You want the fat to render out and the bacon to cook through without becoming crispy. Drain and reserve the bacon fat.

5. Add the bacon fat to a clean pan and reheat over a medium heat. Add the sliced onion with a pinch of salt and the bay leaf, and cook gently until the onion is soft and aromatic but without taking on colour.

6. Add the leek and stir while cooking for 3 mins or so. Add a tea spoon of water if necessary.

7. Add the fried bacon pieces, the thyme sprigs, and minced garlic. You can add the sliced mushrooms here if you’re including them. Cook for 5 mins.

8. Season with white pepper and add the white wine. Reduce by a third.

9. Meanwhile, drain the artichokes then add the stock to the pan. Stir in the mustard and cream and reduce the sauce a little more with a gentle simmer.

10. Place the roux back over a medium heat and stir in a quarter of the sauce. Keep stirring as it comes up to the boil. This prevents lumps. Now add half the remaining sauce and repeat. Again with the last of the sauce. You should have a beautiful, glossy and thickened sauce similar in consistency to double cream.

11. Add the Jerusalem artichokes and parmesan to the pan and cook for about 10 mins until the artichokes are soft. For the last few minutes add the quartered Brussels sprouts and chestnuts. Let the pie filling cool to room temperature then put it in the fridge to chill.

MAKE THE PASTRY ELEMENTS:

1. Divide the pastry dough into a third and two thirds. Wrap the larger piece in clingfilm and return to the fridge.

2. Roll the smaller piece of pastry to about 4mm thick. Use the base of the cake tin to cut out the pie lid. Wrap the lid in clingfilm and place flat in the fridge.

3. Gather up the excess pastry, create a ball and roll out to a thickness of 4mm. Use a lattice cutter and gently pull the pastry apart, keeping it flat, to form the lattice. Use the base of the cake tin to cut a circular lattice. Wrap in clingfilm and place flat in the fridge.

4. Gather up the excess pastry again. Wrap in clingfilm and return to the fridge. There’s one last decorative element to make later.

5. Now get the larger piece of pastry from the fridge. Roll it into a circle, 4mm thick. It must be big enough to line the base and sides of the tin. Loosely gather it around your rolling pin then carefully drape over the cake tin.

6. Working in a circle, lift the pastry edge clear of the tin so the pastry falls in. Carefully press the pastry into the corners at the base. Bring it up the side of the tin and over the lip. Be careful not to stretch the pastry. Put the cake tin in the fridge for 30 minutes until the pastry has firmed up.

ASSEMBLE THE PIE:

1. Preheat the oven to 190C.

2. Prepare the egg wash. Whisk an egg with a small pinch of salt.

3. Using a knife, trim the excess pastry from around the cake tin. Add the pastry trimmings to the excess in the fridge.

Chilled pastry base filled with the cold pie mixture

4. Fill the pie base with the cold artichoke filling, spreading it evenly and right into the corners.

5. Place the pastry lid over the top. It should sit within the pastry walls. Egg-wash the lid then coax the top of the pastry walls away from the tin and gently push down onto the pastry lid to seal the pie. This should create a rim about 1cm wide around the lid.

6. Locate the lattice centrally over the lid. Trim the lattice ends with a knife to fit nicely within the rim. Egg-wash the lattice. Ideally the rim and lattice should be level. Return the pie to the fridge.

7. Now for the final decoration. With the remaining pastry you want to create 2 long strings about 5mm wide. You can try rolling these out using your hand but the easiest and most consistent way I found was to use my pasta machine with a tagliatelle cutter. Platt the 2 strings together. Egg-wash the rim of the pastry lid and stick the platt on top, following the circumference of the pie.

8. The pie needs a chimney to let the steam escape so cut a hole in the centre of the lid. I used a 1cm metal nozzle for piping bags, which also doubled up as the chimney. Roll out any last pastry to a thickness of 4mm. With the large end of the nozzle, cut out a disk of pastry. Cut the centre from the disk using the small end of the nozzle. You’re left with a doughnut. Roll the doughnut onto the small end of the nozzle and place that small end into the hole in the pie lid. Gently stick the doughnut down onto the lid.

9. Egg-wash the platt and the doughnut around the chimney. Return the pie to the fridge.

10. When the first egg-wash is dry, egg-wash the lid, lattice, platt and doughnut a second time so the pastry gains a great colour in the oven. Bake the pie for 35 to 40 minutes, until golden.

FINAL THOUGHTS

The pie decorations aren’t necessary but I think they’re well worth it in the end. Don’t get me wrong, they can be a right faff!

The lattice is easy—when you have a lattice cutter. Using a ruler can work but takes time—all the while the pastry is warming up and devising cunning ways to fuck you up. Cutting the slots freehand is never accurate, and in my experience only produces a wonky and irregular pattern that looks rubbish.

Honestly, the air was blue when I was making the pastry strings for the second time. And when I got them to work, the damned platt snapped because the pastry was too warm. Grrr! So I chilled the next strings. But they snapped because they were too cold. Grrrrrrr! Then I had the epiphany—use the pasta machine. Of course, I had to chill the dough again.

And don’t skimp on the egg wash. Do it twice and wait for it to dry in between. For a deeper colour, just use egg yolk.

Anyway, all’s well that ends well. Actually, it’s the enjoyment of techniques and intricate work that makes me want to try out new things. Practice! Practice! So expect to hear more—there’s a Wellington project planned in the coming weeks.

I served the pie simply—with curly kale cooked l’étuvée; in butter and just a splash of water. Partly because I couldn’t be arsed to do anything more glamourous. Lol.

Fartichoke pie