Greek chicken pie

Serves: 6
Course: Main Course
Cooking Time: 1 hr 0 mins
Ingredients
  • 100g butter, plus more melted butter for brushing
  • 6 onions, peeled and diced
  • 2 bay leaves
  • 1 freshly cooked chicken, about 1.2kg (free range if possible)
  • 3 eggs, beaten
  • Salt
  • Black pepper
  • 5 sheets of filo pastry

1 Preheat the oven to 200 degrees.

2 Put the butter in a pot and add the onions and bay leaves, cover and cook over a gentle heat for 20 minutes, until they become soft and translucent.

3 Meanwhile, take the chicken from the bag and pour all the chicken juices into the onions to reduce and become jammy, then take off the heat.

4 Remove the skin from the chicken, discard half and chop the rest finely.

5 Chop the chicken into chunks and add the skin and the meat into the onions, followed by the eggs. Mix everything together and season.

6 Take a deep springform cake tin – mine was 25cm wide x 5cm deep – and brush it with melted butter. Line the tin with the filo pastry sheets at alternate angles along the base and sides of the tin . The pastry should overhang the sides, and each sheet should be brushed with a little melted butter. Do this with four of the sheets and leave one until last.

7 Put the chicken mixture into the tin, then fold the last sheet of filo in half and place on top of the chicken mixture and butter. Bring the overhanging filo back over the top to seal and brush the top with a little more melted butter.

8 Bake in the oven for 30 minutes, until golden and crisp. Serve with a green salad.

Paul Flynn

Paul Flynn

Paul Flynn is a chef, restaurateur and contributor to The Irish Times. He and his wife, Máire, run the Tannery restaurant and cookery school in Dungarvan, Co Waterford