Sausage Pie

Sausage Pie
Dorcas Annette Walker

Another New Year with blank pages spread out before us; a time of making new resolutions as we evaluate the past. Little did I realize four years ago when I wrote a cooking column at a local editor’s request that it would evolve into a regular column and blog where I would get to meet folk via the internet not only around the United States, but Canada and Britain. One sweet fellow up in Ohio invited me to appear on his televised weekly cooking show. I nicely declined as I’m not into the new fangled ways of cooking with strange pots and pans in front of an audience. My greatest inspiration that draws me to my kitchen each week is the emails and phone calls from you local folk here in Tennessee that tell me that my column is the first thing read in the Friday edition. I figured I’d have run out of recipes long before now. Instead this past week I began filling another notebook with some more old recipes to redo along with new ideas to try out. I’ve found cooking to be a grand adventure that time doesn’t diminish.

This week I’m featuring an oldie my fellows love evolved on the spur of the moment many years ago one afternoon when I was baking in kitchen and realized I hadn’t planned anything for supper. I found leftover carrots and peas and since I was making pies I decided to add potatoes, some sausage, and turn it into a pie. Nothing fancy, but I figured it would be filling. My husband loved it so much that he bragged about my Sausage Pie until I had to make another one for his friends. They acted like it was the best thing they had ever eaten. Since then I’ve made Sausage Pie for visitors and once on a mission trip out west- at my husband and friend’s request as to me a meat pie isn’t fancy company fare. For some reason a meat pie seems to be a man’s dish. I’ve never had a recipe for it so when I made up a Sausage Pie this week I measured and wrote things down.

My Sausage Pie is a colorful blend of vegetables, potatoes, and sausage wrapped together in a flaky pastry crust that makes a hearty meal. Leftovers can be frozen and reheated up for another time. Preparation time for the Sausage Pie is around 30 minutes (not counting baking time) and this recipe serves six.

Sausage Pie

2 pastries for a 10-inch pie
1 lb sausage (your choice) browned & crumbled
2 c potatoes peeled, diced, & cooked
2 c carrots peeled, sliced, & cooked
1 (15 oz) can of peas
1 tsp dried parsley flakes
1 tsp seasoned salt
salt & pepper

Drain vegetables and layer in the pie crust with the sausage. Sprinkle parsley flakes and seasoned salt adding regular salt & pepper to taste. Cover with a top crust and crimp the edges together. Bake at 350º for 1 hr until the crust is nicely browned. Serve hot!

Weekly tip: Using cold ingredients and not over-mixing or over-working the dough makes for a flakier pie crust while glass or dull metal pie pans brown the pastry best!

Dorcas Annette Walker is a published author, columnist, speaker, freelance magazine writer, and photographer from Jamestown, Tennessee. Contact her at: dorcasannettewalker@gmail.com For more recipes check out her Creative Tennessee Mountain Cookin blog at: www.dorcasannettewalker.webs.com