Sausage and Mustard Pie

Sausage, carrots and potato cooked in a creamy mustard sauce and topped with golden puff pastry. This creamy sausage and mustard pie is a lovely, warming, winter comfort food dinner.

It's all cooked in one pan, and the addition of the carrots and potatoes means it can be a complete meal, without having to cook extra side dishes!

Ingredients:

• 1 tbsp oil
• 6 large pork sausages chopped into bitesize chunks (about 400g/14oz)
• 1 onion peeled and chopped
• 2 carrots peeled and chopped
• ¼ tsp salt
• ½ tsp black pepper
• 3 cloves garlic peeled and minced
• 1 tbsp plain (all-purpose) flour
• 600 ml (2.5 cups) chicken stock
• 1 heaped tbsp wholegrain mustard
• 2 medium potatoes peeled and chopped into bitesize pieces (about 400g/14oz altogether)* see note 1
• 80 ml (¼ cup + 1 tbsp) double (heavy) cream
• 2 x 320g/11oz rolls of ready-rolled puff pastry
• 1 small egg lightly whisked

Instructions:

1. Heat the oil in a wide, shallow, oven-proof casserole dish *see note 2, over a medium-high heat.

2. Add the chopped sausage and fry for about 5 minutes, stirring regularly, until the sausage is lightly browned (it doesn’t have to be cooked through at this point). Remove from the pan and place on a plate.

3. Add the onion and carrots to the pan and fry for 5 minutes, stirring often, until the onion starts to soften.

4. Add in the salt, pepper and garlic and stir together.

5. Add the flour, then stir to coat the vegetables.

6. Pour in the chicken stock and add the wholegrain mustard.

7. Add the potatoes and stir together, then bring to the boil and simmer for 10 minutes, until the potatoes are just starting to soften at the edges.

8. Whilst the pie filling is simmering, pre-heat the oven to 200c/400f (fan). After 10 minutes simmering, add the cooked sausages and stir in the cream. Then turn off the heat.

9. Carefully top the casserole dish with the puff pastry. I use two rolls of puff pastry that I squash together. This leaves a bit of a seam down the centre of the pie, but I think that’s fine, since it’s quite a rustic pie.

10. Cut off any really large bits of overhanging pastry, then roll the rest of the overhanging pastry up and back into the pan, to make a rough crust. If you like, you can make a bit of a pastry decoration out of the pastry offcuts (I make a few simple leaves) and place on top of the pie.