Cooking with Brainclaw! Learn to cook a Steak and Ale Pie!
Getting ready to make the Uzumaki Steak and Ale Pie…
(stunning culinary photography by Taraclaw, mostly)
So, you want to make a steak and ale pie to warm your insides during this cold tail-end of winter, huh? Well, David from Brainclaw is here to show you exactly how to do it! What follows is a huge, fairly funny pictorial cooking lesson with a full recipe and directions. Try it out! This is a mutation of a classic British recipe for a hot, steamy, flaky meat pie. Vegetarians and vegans can stop reading now, if you haven’t already. Let’s get started…
Ingredients List for one Davidclaw Deep Dish Uzumaki Steak and Ale Pie:
2 cups all purpose flour
1 box of pie crust mix, enough for 2 pie crusts (or make your own if you have time!)
2 nice steaks (use organic beef!) or you can use regular old beef stew meat if you are cheap.
1 nice onion, we use Vidalia onions! Yum!
Pam cooking spray or equivalent
salt
pepper (or season to taste, many possibilities here)
vegetable oil
2 garlic cloves
shredded cheeses of your choice, cheddar works best
and the main Secret Ingredient…
1 six-pack of Miller Genuine Draft in bottles… ICE COLD.
Have a sharp knife, an oven-safe deep dish pie pan, 2 cutting boards, a cookie sheet, a nice deep frying pan, an Xbox 360 and the Elder Scrolls Oblivion software, a fork and a spatula…
First things first… flour that cutting board!
Flour your cutting board with some of your all-purpose flour, getting some on your face and shirt to make people think you know what you are doing. This also serves the purpose of preventing your pie crusts from sticking.
Prepare the dough balls!
Following the instructions on the pie crust mix box, make the pie crust into two equal dough balls, that we like to call boluses (boli?) OK, that IS gross, sorry.
Our more or less circular pie crust.
Roll out the first one on the floured cutting board, making it flat and even, and about an inch and a half larger than your pie dish all around. Try to keep it as circular as possible. This took us several tries, but it’s fun! Once it is done, place it gently in the pie dish. Repeat for the pie crust topper, and set that aside as well, on a non-stick area. Prevent cats from walking on it.
Mr. Meat!
Now whip out your meat! Remember to have the high-quality organic beef thawed and close to room temperature. Frozen meat is… unpredictable.
Remember, all good chefs continuously SAMPLE their ingredients!
Remember, it is VITAL that this particular ingredient be sampled continuously throughout the cooking process to insure proper functionality of the chef and the final dish. Really. We’re serious here.
Cut organic beef into bite-sized pieces.
Taking your insanely expensive and meticulously well-maintained Faberware knife, slice beef into bite-sized pieces. This will speed the cooking process, and aid the consumer of the pie later. The last thing you want for your dining experience is the dreaded “giant piece of beef in the mouth and empty pie shell on the plate” syndrome that afflicts some junior chefs.
Dredging the beef cubes in flour.
This part is tedious, but necessary for a successful meat pie. Sampling the beer early on will help this part go by miraculously fast! Take four or five pieces of beef at a time and roll them in the flour. This will help seal in flavor during cooking, as well as forming a thick, rich gravy which will ooze out of your pie and down your face later. Having several cats on hand can help remedy this situation.
Dredged beef pieces.
Place your dredged beef pieces on a clean, dry plate and set aside.
Sauté your onions.
Take your lovely Vidalia onion, skin it, and mince it medium fine on another cutting board. Mince the garlic cloves as well. Pop the minced onion and garlic into your deep frying pan with some vegetable oil and sauté until lightly browned and translucent. Don’t overcook, or we’ll KILL YOU! No, just kidding, but they will continue to cook all throughout the rest of the procedure. And your house will stink, real real bad.
Keep them onions and garlic movin’ in that pan, son!
Sauté dredged beef pieces with onions and garlic.
Carefully add your dredged beef pieces to the sautéing onion mixture, adding some more vegetable oil to keep things lubed up. Cook on high gas heat. Only losers use electric stoves. (Editor’s note: David says he’s sorry for being an elitist, and those of you with electric stoves can do this just fine.)
Use the Davidclaw One-Handed Flip technique!
Keep the beef and onion/garlic mixture moving while sautéing. Try this cool one-handed flip and pull technique if you are feeling brave and haven’t sampled too much of the main ingredient yet! Novices attempt with caution! spillage at this point will require a re-boot of this whole freaking process!
Prepare the Secret Ingredient!
This is why you need a cold six pack on hand. DON’T TRY THIS WITH JUST ONE BEER IN THE HOUSE! You need to leave at least half a beer for this part of the procedure. We’ve found this to be… difficult.
Add the Secret Ingredient slowly!
Remember to add the Secret Ingredient S L O W L Y. You don’t want a “Foamalanche” on your stove at this point. An unexpected Foamalanche would ALSO require a re-boot of the whole freaking procedure. Let the hoppy, meaty aroma waft delicately into your nostrils at this point… Ahhhhh…
The Primordial Mass begins to take shape… IT’S ALIVE!
Keep the ingredients moving with a plastic spatula whilst remaining to cook on high heat. The mixture will begin to thicken, so get ready to add…
Add BEEF BROFF… I mean, Beef Broth.
Chill out that bubbling mass of liquid love with half a can of nondescript beef broth. This will slow things down and add much flavor. “Relax, don’t do it…” Ahem. Never mind.
Add more BROTH…
After the mixture begins to thicken again, add the remaining beef broth, salt, pepper and season to your taste, and FOR GOD’S SAKE, MAN, KEEP STIRRING!
A stirring experience…
Voids of Pastry, waiting to be filled…
Get your pie dish and top crust ready! It’s time to make culinary magic! Plus, the house is starting to smell like a rodeo…
Add one layer of beefy mixture to the pie dish.
OK, you hooligans. Add a layer of that insanely beefy mixture to your pie dish. Spread it gently out over the pie crust, taking care not to rip it, you clumsy, ham-fisted idiot! (I have no internal dialogue…) Take a moment to taste more of the Secret Ingredient at this point, then step back and admire your handiwork.
Add a layer of shredded CHEDDAR JACK, MOFO!
We like to add a layer of shredded cheddar jack at this point, but almost any tangy cheese will do. Beef, cheese, how can you go wrong? The hot meat melts the cheese… oh… OH… ARGH! Oops. Sorry.
Add the remainder of the beefy mixture!
Empty the rest of the beefy mix into the pie dish, covering the cheese completely. Mound it up in the center just a little bit, like a Mayan burial mound, or something… I don’t freaking know. Just do it.
ADD MORE FREAKIN’ CHEESE, fer CHRISSAKES!
Yep, add even more cheese on top of the final layer of beefy mixture. This will insure that you get your recommended daily allowance of cheese. It will also melt, but if you use pure sharp cheddar at this point, it won’t melt as much until later… Don’t panic!
Fold pie crust edges over…
Place top pie crust… um.. on top, of course.
Trim excess pie crust with your fork.
FORK YOU! Take your fork and press the tines against the lip of the pie dish, perforating it and making it easy to remove the excess. But don’t discard this doughy sprue! Keep it handy for…
…and I’LL form the UZUMAKI!
We saw this freaky Japanese horror movie awhile back called UZUMAKI (means ’spiral’ in Japanese) where everyone turned into spirals and died, or something, PLUS we don’t like to waste ingredients, so take your excess dough from the top crust, roll it out REALLY THIN into a long snake, and spiral it on top of the pie!
U Z U M A K I !
Apply low heat for a long time…
Put a nice, big cookie sheet in your 350 degree pre-heated GAS oven (sorry) and place your happy little meat pie on the cookie sheet, to prevent any liquid love from boiling over and trashing your oven’s insides. Close oven before cats can jump in. Or don’t if you have some to spare…
Find SOMETHING to do for an hour…
It is VITAL to find something fun to do for about an hour. We’ve got some suggestions… Check the pie periodically to make sure it doesn’t overcook, since ovens can vary in their heating abilities. Remember to save your game often, and continue to sample the Secret Ingredient.
THE FINAL PRODUCT!!!
By now, a massively powerful food odor has permeated your home, jarring you from your liberation of Kvatch from the demonic forces of Oblivion… eh, never mind. Go take the damn thing out of the oven after you save your game.
A slice of heaven…
It doesn’t get much better than this folks!
Offer some to your wife! OPEN WIDE, HONEY!
This took us about two hours to make, and we had some beers, and one thing led to another, and it was like, 10:30 when we started, so when we went to offer it to our trusty wife…
Oops… More for us.
Don’t fret! This just means you get to eat the whole pie yourself! Thank for joining us on this culinary journey into beefyness! More Cooking with Brainclaw coming soon…
end of line.
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