Individual Chicken Pot Pies

I love, love, love chicken pot pies, so I was super excited while making it! It was so so good!! My little man sucked his down, and loved watching the "Paw Pies" bake in the oven! I served it with a super simple salad of chopped red leaf lettuce tossed with a balsalmic v1negarette I made (1 tablespoon Extra Virgin Olive Oil, 3 tablespoons balsalmic vinegar, salt and pepper) and topped with some shaved parmesean. Mmmmmm!!


Ya, I'm not gonna feed my two year old out of a ceramic ramekin, so I dished his out like this! And, look! You can see what the filling looks like! Genius, I am!
















To put this in your belly;
This recipe takes about 50 minutes to prep and cook.

cooking spray
1 pound chicken breasts or thighs, whichever you prefer, cubed
salt
pepper
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 cup carrot, diced (3 or 4, size dependant)
1 cup celery, diced (4 or 5 stalks, depending on size)
1 medium potato, cubed
2 1/4 cups milk
1 can 99% fat free, low sodium cream of mushroom soup
1 tablespoon chicken buillon (or 1 cube if using cubes)
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 cup frozen peas
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 tablespoon water
1 tablespoon fresh parsley, chopped
1 sheet puffed pastry, thawed

Preheat oven to 375 degrees

Season chicken with salt and pepper. In a large pot or dutch oven sprayed with cooking spray, cook the chicken over meduim heat until cooked through, about 5 minutes. Add onions and garlic and cook until beginning to soften, 2 minutes. Stir in carrots and celery and cook until they start to soften, about 5 minutes.

Stir in potato, milk, soup, buillon, nutmeg, and pepper. Bring to a boil and simmer 10 to 15 minutes, until potato is soft.

Meanwhile, roll out the puffed pastry to about half it's original thickness. Lay a ramekin, top side down, and, using a paring knife, cut the pastry 1/2 inch wider than the ramekin. When needed, roll the pastry into a ball and roll back out until you have made enough rounds to cover all ramekins (I was able to make 6 rounds out of mine.)

Add peas. With a fork or whisk, in a small bowl, stir together cornstarch and water to make a slurry. Add in a few spoonfulls of the liquid from the pot to bring the temperature of the slurry up. Stir the slurry into the pot pie filling, bring to a boil and reduce heat, simmer until thickened. Stir in parsley.

Ladel the filling into each ramekin. Wet your finger and dampen the edges of the pastry round. Lay on top of the filled ramekins and press the edges down so they stick to the sides of the ramekin and form a seal. Place the ramekins on a baking sheet (Or 2 if they weigh down the pan too much), spray with butter flavored cooking spray, and sprinkle salt and pepper over the top. Cut a slit or three in the tops of each pastry and bake for 15 minutes, until the pastry puffs up and turns a pretty light golden brown. Let cool for 5 minutes so you don't render yourself unable to taste!

Place each ramekin on a plate (Since it's hot and no one wants to touch hot bowls!), and sprinkle the top with some freshly grated parmesan. Enjoy!! Be careful, it's hot!!

This recipe makes 6 to 12 pot pies, depending on ramekin size!

I made mine with 8 oz ramekins, because it's what I have and I'm into the smaller portion size, so it made 12 for me, but if you have 10 oz ones, it will probably make 8.