Chicken and leek pie with a crisp filo top
70 min · 41 g protein · 360 cals / serving
A proper pie for a cold night: tender chicken, soft leeks, mushrooms and peas in a creamy mustard and tarragon sauce, under a shattering golden lid of scrunched filo. All the comfort of a pastry-topped pie, with a crackling crust you can hear.
Ingredients
Filling
- 1 tsp canola oil
- 850 g chicken breast, cut into bite-sized pieces
- 4 leek, thickly sliced and washed
- 400 g mushrooms, chestnut, quartered
- 2 cloves garlic, crushed
- 3 tbsp all-purpose flour, plain flour
- 400 ml chicken broth
- 200 ml skim milk, skimmed
- 50 g quark
- 1 tbsp wholegrain mustard
- a few sprigs fresh tarragon, leaves chopped, or 1 tsp dried tarragon
- 150 g cooked frozen green peas
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
Top
- 2 large sheets (75 g) phyllo dough
- a few sprays cooking spray, olive oil spray, or 10 g melted butter
Steps
- Heat the oven to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Heat the oil in a large, deep frying pan over a high heat and brown the chicken in two batches, 4 minutes each, until golden but not cooked through. Lift onto a plate.
- Lower the heat to medium, add the leeks and mushrooms with a pinch of the salt and cook for 8–10 minutes, until the leeks are soft and the mushroom juices have cooked away. Add the garlic for 1 minute.
- Sprinkle in the flour and stir for a minute, then gradually stir in the stock and milk until smooth. Simmer for 3 minutes until thickened, then stir in the mustard, tarragon, peas, the chicken and its juices and the rest of the salt and the pepper. Take the pan off the heat and stir in the quark until the sauce is creamy. Tip into a 2-litre baking dish.
- Spray each filo sheet lightly with oil, tear it in half, then scrunch the pieces loosely and lay them on top of the filling until it is covered with golden ruffles. Bake for 25–30 minutes, until the filo is deep golden, the filling bubbles at the edges and the chicken is 165°F. Rest for 5 minutes before serving.
Good to know
Why filo instead of puff pastry?
Two sheets of filo give a crisper, flakier lid than a full sheet of puff pastry and use a fraction of the fat, so the creamy filling is what you taste.
Can I use leftover roast chicken?
Yes. Skip step 1, use about 600 g of shredded cooked chicken, and stir it in with the peas. It is a very good Monday pie after a Sunday roast.
What to serve with it?
Steamed greens, green beans or buttered cabbage, and a little mash if you want a bigger plate.
Alternative
Per
- Calories
- 98
- Protein
- (47%)
- 11 g
- Fat
- (18%)
- 2 g
- Carbohydrates
- (36%)
- 9 g
- of which sugar
- 2 g
- Fiber
- 1 g
- Sodium
- 201 mg
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Computed from the ingredients with our published formula, not yet kitchen-tested. General guidance, not medical advice. Talk to your prescriber. How
As written, 2161 kcal goes into the pot and 2795 g of ingredients comes out as about 2215 g of food: 98 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water and energy density is the score's biggest lever, so the dish is scored as cooked, not as an average of its parts. Every ingredient links to its food page, with the same data and score. The label's percentages are each macronutrient's share of the calories. The full formula.