Leek and Butter Bean Pie
Leeks cooked down slowly in butter until they are almost a jam, butter beans for body, mustard and tarragon to stop it being bland. One sheet of shop-bought pastry and no apology for it.
- Prep 20 min
- Cook 55 min
- Total 1 h 15 min
- Serves 4
- Vegetarian
Method
Step 1. Wash the leeks properly. Slice first, then swill the rounds in a bowl of cold water and lift them out with your hands, leaving the grit behind. Grit in a leek pie is unforgivable and unfixable.
Step 2. Melt the butter with the oil in a wide pan. Add the leeks with a good pinch of salt, cover, and cook over a low heat for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. They should collapse to about a third of their volume and stay pale.
Step 3. Uncover, add the garlic and tarragon, and cook for 3 minutes more.
Step 4. Sprinkle over the flour and stir for 2 minutes. Add the stock a little at a time, then the cream and both mustards. Simmer for 5 minutes until thick.
Step 5. Fold in the butter beans and season with salt and white pepper. It should taste slightly too seasoned — the pastry flattens it. Tip into a 24 cm pie dish and let it cool for 15 minutes.
Step 6. Heat the oven to 200°C fan. Lay the pastry over the dish, trim to a 2 cm overhang, press the edge down and crimp. Cut two slits in the middle.
Step 7. Brush with beaten egg and bake for 30 minutes, until deep gold and risen and you can see the filling bubbling through the slits.
Step 8. Rest 10 minutes. Serve with something sharp — a green salad with a hard vinaigrette, or buttered greens.
Notes from the kitchen
- Cooling the filling before the pastry goes on is what keeps the base of the lid from going soggy. Fifteen minutes is enough.
- Most supermarket puff pastry is made with vegetable fat and is vegetarian, but read the label — some all-butter versions are fine too, and a few are made with animal fat.
- For a vegan pie: olive oil for the butter, oat cream for the double cream, plant milk to glaze. Check the pastry.
