How to make a holiday treat, pork pie with chestnuts and Chinese sausage – pretty, delicate and light
- You may think of a pork pie as dense and meaty, with hard pastry. This one is different – light and pretty enough to grace a festive meal or buffet table
- Once you’ve chopped and fried the filling ingredients, the secret to success is to ensure everything stays chilled ’til you’re ready to put the pies in the oven
If you think of pork pies as dense and meaty, with hard pastry that’s sturdy enough to carry on a picnic or eat out of hand at a football match without crumbling, this one will change your perception.
This pie – made with puff pastry and a pork filling flavoured with Chinese wind-dried meats, chestnuts and mushrooms – is pretty and delicate, and light enough to be served as part of a holiday buffet or as a starter to a festive meal.
Pork pie with chestnuts and Chinese sausage
This pie looks difficult but needs only about 45 minutes of active work – much of the time it takes to make is taken up with letting the dough rest in the fridge to firm up. Commercial puff pastry sheets vary in size and weight, so adapt the size (and shape) of the pie according to the brand of pastry you buy.
The all-butter puff pastry I use (Waitrose) comes as two sheets that are about 28cm x 22cm (11 x 8½ in), so the brand you use should give you about the same total area of pastry. This recipe makes two pies that are about 12cm by 18cm (5 x 7 in), which I like because making two pies gives you a better crust-to-filling ratio than if you were to make one large square or round pie. You can make it as one large pie, of course, but you will need to bake it for longer.
If possible, buy cooked chestnuts from the roasted chestnut vendor, because they have a deliciously smoky flavour. Remove the shells and papery skin while the chestnuts are hot. You can also use cooked, plain (unsweetened) shelled chestnuts, sold in foil packs, or you can roast fresh chestnuts in the oven.
Keep all the ingredients cold, especially the puff pastry. Be sure to defrost the puff pastry in the fridge; if you do it at room temperature, the dough will sweat too much.
