Tourtiere is a fancy French word for meat pie, commonly eaten on Christmas Eve in many a Quebecois home. It is usually made with a blend of ground beef and pork, onions, perhaps garlic and always with sage, thyme, and sometimes cloves. Mom often made meat pies for our family in our younger years. I’m pretty sure she always used ground beef. It was a favourite of my dad’s, enjoyed hot or cold, always tasty and delicious.
Throw any old piece of meat at me and I can come up with a tasty dish. But, there’s a part of cooking that I’ve never mastered. The ubiquitous pie crust. Now, having said that, the truth is I’ve probably made a pie crust four times – in my life. And every time I entertained the notion that I’d like to make a pie, it usually ended in a less than optimum experience for me and for those who sat at my table.
Never let it be said that I give up easily. I’d been thinking about making a meat pie for a few weeks now; the picture perfect crust, with swirls of steam rising up through the slits in the top, smelling up my kitchen with the scent of sage and garlic.
I visited my local butcher and picked up fresh ground pork for the filling. After discussing the merits of home baking, I purchased the pure white lard that he renders down himself. He and his wife have provided our family with wonderful cuts of meat for 25 years now. I trusted him when he said this was perfect lard for pies while trying not to stare at his rather large, pear shaped body and apple dumpling cheeks.
Four or five cook books later, I decided on the perfect pie crust recipe. How hard can this be? There are only 4 ingredients. A piece of cake. Well, you know what I mean. I took out my beautiful, old, pottery bowl, the one that Brian’s grandmother used, hoping that some of her pie making skills would still be hovering round. I felt I needed all the help I could get. With a silent prayer to the pastry chef up above, I measured out my flour, salt and lard.
I felt quite exuberant when the lard cut beautifully into the flour and created those perfect little pea-shaped bits of joy that my recipe book stated would make the perfect pie crust. Sprinkle the flour-shortening mix with ice cold water and mix lightly with a fork. Form into a ball. OK. Done. They say it’s easier to work with cold dough, so I put half the dough in the fridge while I rolled out the bottom crust.
Now, here’s where everything got shot to hell. When I patted and tried to press down the ball of dough in preparation for the rolling pin – it shattered into a mess of little pieces of dough. I can remember mom’s voice in my ear “Barbara, the less handling, the better”. By this time, my shoulders were so tense you could have hit me with a tennis ball, and it would have bounced off with no impression. My breathing was audible, and I was starting to hyperventilate. No worries. Calm down. I decided to throw caution to the winds. I added a bit more lard, (this was not going to be a healthy dinner anyway, so what difference a few more artery-clogging fats?) The dough seemed to work a bit better, and after I added a few more drops of cold water, I actually had kind of a pie crust going on – it wasn’t round and it had a lot of thin and sometimes missing pieces, but hey, after I scraped it off the counter (yeah, I know – use flour), and threw it onto the pie plate, it didn’t look so bad. Of course, I had to patch up a few places – well, who’s kidding who, I created the whole friggin’ pie crust like a jigsaw puzzle with bits and pieces tacked on here and there. Voila! Once I poured my beautiful pork mixture over it, the whole thing almost resembled a pie! With one episode under my belt, I felt confident, assured - scared. The second rolling out worked much better. At least it didn’t crumble like an old dusty brick wall when I repeated the rolling pin scenario. I worked quickly and efficiently, rolling out just enough to lay over the meat. I pieced and patched as above, praying that once cooked, it would all miraculously meld together. In the oven it went and then I turned and looked at my kitchen. Who knew that 2 cups of flour could spread so far? There was flour on the counter, the mixing bowl, the utensils, the floor, my elbows. Was there any left in the pie?
The pie sits cooling on the wire rack. It looks pretty good - from a distance. After a bit, I muster up my courage and cut into it. The crust is quite flaky though the filling appears to be somewhat dry. After my third bite, I decide the crust is quite good – certainly better than anything I’ve bought in a store – however, the meat filling is not spicy enough and too dry for my taste.
No one is more surprised than I am. Here, I was expecting the crust to be my failure and it turns out the meat was. Next time I will add more spice and liquid to the filling. Yes, I said next time. Who knows, I just might become the tourtiere expert in my little corner of the world. In the meantime, I’ll serve this dry pie with mashed squash and a fresh, crunchy salad. I don’t expect I'll get any complaints from the farmer. And I didn’t.
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