Pies, Pasties and Great Yarmouth

I haven't taken photos but I've already made good use of one pack of the yellow-stickered frozen puff pastry I bought the other day. I used it in combination with a pack of Aldi ready-rolled shortcrust pastry that I rolled out even thinner, and I got 6 deep-filled steak and kidney pies and 2 steak and kidney pasties out of it. I used the shortcrust for the pie bases and the puff for the tops, the leftover puff made the pasties. I used my Salter deep-fill electric pie maker for the pies which makes lovely big, deep pies that I fill to the very top.

The filling was 2 lb of stewing steak from the local butcher and a large ox kidney (bought yellow-stickered from Morrisons) tossed in flour seasoned with salt and black pepper and lightly browned, and I also softened a couple of onions.This was all put in the slow cooker with some red wine, a couple of tablespoons of tomato puree, 2 beef stock cubes, a little water and dried thyme. The flour thickened the gravy nicely and 7 hours on low made the meat lovely and tender. After making the pies and pasties there was a little of the meat mixture left over which I'll freeze for another time. We each had a pie with mash and veg for dinner tonight, and that leaves 2 pies and the 2 pasties for my sons' lunches. 

The pastry cost £1.25 for the 2 packs, and the filling was approximately £5. So for £6.25 I made 6 pies, 2 pasties and have some leftover filling for another day. Not bad going!

We're not going to DD1's for the half term break as she has to work extra shifts to cover staff shortages. Instead I've used the money we would have spent on fares and eating out and booked a last minute coach break with Shearings. We're going to Great Yarmouth for 3 nights from Friday 24th Oct . For £99 each we get return coach travel from Dover, 3 nights dinner, bed and breakfast plus an outing to Norwich. Shearings hotels are certainly not fancy but they are pretty good value for money especially when taking advantage of last minute reductions, and East Anglia is an area on the country we've yet to visit. Fingers crossed for good weather.

That's all for tonight, folks. Enjoy the rest of your evening. Love Helen xx