Carol’s Chicken Pie (main dish)

When TV dinners in segmented foil plates  on TV trays first fed Americans sitting in front of the Milton Berle, Jimmy Durante, Perry Como, and Ed Sullivan in the 1950’s, Swanson’s chicken pot pie was my favorite–filled with chicken, peas, and carrots and grossly oversalted.  I loved it.  By the time I left home for college at the University of Minnesota Duluth in 1965, the Swanson’s chicken pot pie was mostly thin gravy with very few piece of vegetables, but still over salted.  Despite the diminishing quality, I was poor and bought a dozen pies at 10 cents apiece to get me through my first month with no paycheck (I only had $35 dollars for 30 days).  In the late, 1970’s, in a move to impress my new love (still here almost 33 years later), I developed my own heartier, lustier (I was feeling a bit lusty at the time), more vegetable-filled version of the chicken pot pie.  It is essentially a chicken stew with a baking powder biscuit top crust.  This recipe was one of my most successful rhetorical strategies.  It hit all notes:  my cooking ethos established itself, the pie’s pathetic appeal to the familiar filled my darling with affection, and the 50’s logic (the old nutritional triangle) of meat, veggies, and carbs made pefect sense (logos).  I later served the pie to my in-laws.  It is a comfort food.  No one doesn’t like it.  Here it is.

Carol’s Chicken Pie

2 medium carrots, sliced

2 ribs celery, sliced

2/3 cups slices (into 1-2 inch lengths) fresh green beans

1/2 cup frozen whole kernal corn

1/4 cup chopped parsley.

1-2 chicken boullion cubes

2 T. olive oil

2 cups cut up chicken (breast or thighs)

8 oz. fresh mushrooms, sliced

1 large onion coasely chopped

1/2 tsp. Kitchen Bouquet

1/2 cup flour and 1/2-2/3 cup water shaken in a jar or mixed with a whisk to make a smooth slurry to make a gravy

Preheat oven to 475 degrees

Steam carrots, celery, green beans, and whole kernal corn in a steamer basket over 2 cups of water in a saucepan.   Cook until almost, but not quite soft.

While vegetables are cooking, heat olive oil on medium heat in a medium skillet.  Add chicken and cook until no longer pink on the outside. Add mushrooms and onions and cook until mushrooms are cooked through.

Put chicken  into round 2 -3 qt casserole dish.  Add steamed vegetables (1st paragraph).  Don’t discard water from veggies.

To make gravy:  In chicken skillet, add vegetable water, boullion cubes, and Kitchen bouquet. Add enough water to bring liquid to fill sautee pan within 1/2 inch of top.  When liquid boils, add flour/water slurry to thicken, continuously and briskly stirring with fork until thickened. Bring to boil.  Pour resulting gravy over mixture in casserole dish.

Top with baking powder biscuit dough and bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown on the top.

Baking Powder Bisuit Dough

2 cups unbleached or all-purpose flour

1/4 cup vegetable or canola oil

4 tsps. baking powder

1 tsp. salt

3/4 cup milk