You asked for it and here it is.
While eating dinner the other night, we a
sked the kids what they would like to eat for their birthdays. This year, I intended to make them whatever they wanted instead of going out for it. We discussed the merits of this favorite dish and that one. My oldest mentioned having a pie birthday. Nothing but different types of pie all day long. Including chicken pot pie, apple pie, and pizza pie. My middle wanted red beans and rice. The youngest’s favorite foods are shrimp and olives, but she thought having pie seemed like a really good idea, so jokingly I suggested she have shrimp and olive pie.
I should’ve realized that she was going to latch onto the idea and not let it go. It’s the sort of girl she is. The problem was that I had never heard of shrimp and olive pie. I threw those exact words into Google, hoping there would be a brilliant recipe. There wasn’t. I asked some friends and relatives and mostly got “ew” as an answer with a few helpful suggestions. It was edging nearer and nearer to the date and I still hadn’t had a brilliant inspiring flash as to how this was going to work. Even more so, My oldest declared he hated shrimp, the middle and my husband hate olives, but I don’t cook more than one meal. I just don’t do that.
The day was getting closer and I still had no idea what I was going to do.
One day, while in the shower, washing my hair, I had the brilliant realization that Mediterranean cuisine had to include shrimp and olives. Right? I consulted my Mediterranean cookbook for confirmation of recipes that used both shrimp and olives. I found nothing, but I found fish recipes that used olives. Seafood is seafood, right? At least now I had an idea.
I imagined it in a tomato based sauce, except I didn’t think the kids would appreciate that. Time to re-evaluate.
I got stuck on the idea of a potpie and found a recipe in Great-Grandma’s book for Never Fail Pie Crust. It sounded like what I need because I can make pie crust that tastes delicious, but I always have trouble rolling it out. Every pie I make has a patchwork crust.
I made the Never-Fail pie crust. It was easy. I divided it into 4 pieces and threw them in the fridge. It wasn’t going to win me points on the Great British Baking show, but it seemed to be a pretty decent pie crust. It was malleable, had a decent texture, you know, the stuff you look for in a pie crust. I could immediately tell that it would be much easier to roll out than other pie crust. As long as I floured my counter and rolling pin properly, it didn’t seem like this was going to be a terrible mess.
With the pie crust made, I was just down to figuring out the filling.
I started by sauteing some onions because onions go into these sorts of things. Right? As they were cooking, I contemplated the contents of my fridge and freezer.
I found a bag of frozen vegetables from Trader Joe’s. Misto Alla Griglia. It’s a mixture of marinated and grilled eggplant, red peppers, and zucchini. I had been contemplating just putting some random herbs from the garden into the pie, but this made it much easier. I chopped the veggies up into bitty pieces and threw them in with the onions. When the mixture was warm and the onions were tender, I threw in some flour and stirred. I added a generous splash or 6 of white wine, a bit more butter.
It was at this point I realized that I hadn’t added the olives yet. I was wondering if it was a good idea to just chop them up and add them to the crust, but the birthday girl would not recognize them as olives, so I threw big pieces into the sauce with the rest of the ingredients.
To make everything creamy, I added some milk. After that, I added the shrimp and threw it the mixture into the pie crust and added the top crust after rolling out with some Romano cheese (inspired by Beverly Goldberg’s Shrimp Parm) and baked until it looked done. About 45 minutes.
Because this was all done on the fly, I don’t have an exact recipe for anything except the pie crust. I just added things until it was right.
The question is then, is this good? Should I try this at home? Yes, please do. I was the only one that ate leftovers. The crust didn’t microwave well, but as a concept this worked out really well. Despite everyone claiming to dislike one or more of the ingredients in the dish, everyone ate it without complaining. I could easily see it made more like any British fish pie recipe with some peas and thyme. I recommend not using pre-cooked shrimp because it overcooks during the length of time it needs to be in the oven.
The Recipe:
Never Fail Pie Crust
Mix together in a large bowl:
4 cups flour
1 t baking powder
1 1/2 t salt
1 T sugar
1 1/2 cup lard or shortening
Mix well, then add:
1 beaten egg
1/4 cup of cold water
1 T vinegar
Blend well, roll out. Makes 4 single crusts or 2 double crusts. Keeps 2 weeks in refrigerator.
For other great pie recipes, check out Breakfast Pie, Apple and Pecan Pie, and Pumpkin Pie.
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