More lunch - chicken, pork and apricot raised pie

I had taken quite a large piece of pork out of the freezer for roasting on Sunday and before I put it in the oven, I cut it in half, thinking I could do something else with the other half.  I do have a mighty repertoire of recipes for using left over roast pork, but thought it might be nice to make something with fresh meat for a change.

But what?

I was browsing idly through the Hairy Bikers' Perfect Pies and was a bit taken with their recipe for raised pork pies. But then again - the chicken, apricot and ham pie looked rather nice too.  And I had some chicken fillets that could do with using. I didn't have any dried apricots - but that was easily remedied.  So I made a variation on their chicken, ham and apricot pie, using pork rather than ham.

I made a hot water pastry, which I left to cool for half an hour or so.  The Hairy Bikers are clearly better a making pastry than me - they rolled their hot water pastry out.  Mine was never, ever going to roll, so I pressed it into my spring-sided cake tin by hand.  I then put diced pork, diced chicken and a hefty handful of chopped dried aprictos, which had been marinating in a very little white wine for about 45 minutes, in the pastry crust, put the lid on and baked it all in a moderate oven for about an hour. Then I took the side off the cake tin and, following the Hair Biker's instructions, egg glazed the top and sides twice, with 15 minutes further baking after each glaze.

The pie, cooling down

In the meantime I had seriously reduced some chicken stock (infused with fresh herb leaves) and when the pie was cold, I poured some of that into the centre of the pie where it set to a loose and slightly runny jelly.

It's not lunchtime - can't eat it yet, tempting though it is

My pie is a much darker colour than theirs, and nothing like as elegant - but I have to say it tastes wonderful. And it made a really rather lovely lunch for work today.

Lunchtime in the office.  Pie, salad and some baked sage and apple stuffing