Pie Hard: The art of making better pies

A guide to pies, pastry, with recipes for your sweet and savoury needs!

The Three Blue Ducks Servo Pie

In 2013, I opened a café/restaurant in Falls Creek for the snow season, alongside my mates and business partners from Three Blue Ducks. We loaded up our beloved company car, a beaten-up Mercedes Sprinter affectionally known as “The Bang Bus” as it was covered in dents, rust and scratches. It was now full to the brim with snowboards, cooking gear, and of course, our dreams! We headed for the mountains.

On the way, we stopped at a servo (petrol station) for snacks and drinks. One of us, not sure who, left a classic servo pie on the dashboard, where it sat, untouched, in the van of dreams for the entire season.

Three Blue Ducks in Falls Creek.

After a season on the the snow, the Bang Bus ended up parked on Macpherson Street in Sydney, down the road from our little cafe for a couple of years… still with the same pie on the dash. The crazy part? It looked exactly the same. No mould. No smell. Just a suspiciously perfect pie in its wrapper. What are they putting in those things to kill everything that could possibly grow?

Eventually, we had to say goodbye to the Bang Bus, and the pie, still unblemished (unlike the Mercedes). I’ve never looked at a servo pie the same way since.

Few things hit the comfort food mark like a proper homemade pie. This week’s newsletter is all about levelling up your pie-making game, so you can bake epic pies with confidence and finally say goodbye to those dodgy ones from the servo.

This week, we cover:

Apple and Blueberry Pie (recipe)

General pastry making tips + A quick gude to pastry varieties

Chicken and Leek Pie (recipe)

Plus… The Epic Cheese and greens pie. Full disclaimer…It’s not one of mine, but I couldn’t write about pies and not include this recipe, I absolutely love it!

It’s actually by my partner/fellow substacker and cookbook author Madalena Roze.

Check out her Substack and (if you like the recipe below) her very tasty recipe packed cookbook Happy and Whole

Beef and bone marrow pir (Rocker Bondi).

Aright lets start with the basics there’s only two steps to get right, the filling and the pastry. There are loads of differnt style of pastry, there a little guide below. These little steps make all the difference in texture and structure.

1. Keep Everything Cold

Butter, flour, water, even your hands if possible. Cold ingredients = flaky layers. Warm butter melts too soon and blends into the flour, which makes the pastry dense instead of light and crisp.

2. Don’t Overwork the Dough

As soon as the dough comes together, stop. Overmixing develops gluten, which is great for bread but not ideal for pastry.

3. Rest and Chill

Let the dough rest in the fridge before rolling, and again before baking if time allows. This helps relax the gluten, prevents shrinking, and gives the butter time to re-set for flakier results.

Magdalenas’ Green & cheese pie in the making.

The first base recipe I’ve shared below uses chicken thighs, leeks, in a white wine and mustard cream sauce. It’s rich but not heavy, with thyme adding a bit of fragrance and warmth. But once you’ve nailed the technique, you can take it anywhere. Here are a few variations to try:

Fish Pie

Swap chicken for chunks of white fish, and prawns. Poach the seafood gently in milk, use the poaching liquid as the base for your sauce, and finish with peas and dill. Under cook the seafood as it’ll cook further when baking the pie. If you don’t poach the fish first, the juices will be released into the pie which can make it too runny.

Veggie Pie

Go full veg with roast pumpkin, kale, and caramelised onion. Add goats cheese or feta for a bit of punch. A bit of miso or mustard in the sauce adds a savory depth. I also give it a nudge with loads of confit garlic, hard herbs such as thyme, rosemary and bay leaves, and preserved lemon. Try using the vegetable as the vestle to cook the pie in (see below).

Pumpkin pie

Lamb & Eggplant

Use leftover slow cooked lamb shoulder or mince. Add roast eggplant, tomato, cinnamon, and cumin for a Middle Eastern feel. Or add lamb mince to greens and chili flake and cover with filo pastry for a Spanakopita vibe.

Spanakopita (Greek, Spinach pie)

Chicken Curry Pie

We’ve had these at Three Blue Ducks for many years. Toss shredded chicken into a simple coconut curry sauce with ginger, turmeric, and curry leaves. Add diced potato or pumpkin. Puff pastry still works great with spice, just keep the sauce thick.

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Chicken and Leek Pie

A fantastic base recipe for chicken and leek pie. This one is topped with rough puff pastry, I used half plain, half wholemeal for a little extra flavour with this one. You could of course opt for plain or if you really want to make it easy, a little store bought puff pastry will do the trick…No judgement!