Pasties

Recipe and Images from Yasmin

This is a very simple dinner to prepare when live is hectic and there are many busy and late nights. This is a meal perfect for when you don't feel like making something that takes a while to develop a great flavour, is filling and healthy. If there are any left over puff pastry sheets to fill with the meat filling, simple sweet pasties can be prepared as well. The list of fillings possible for this pastry design is endless, so have a go at mixing your favourite sweet and savoury flavours to produce something simply delicious. If serving this meal as a dinner, be sure to serve with a beautiful garden salad. I apologise in advance for this inartistic photo of the meal, we were in a hurry to eat and I couldn't prepare a decent setting for the meal. It is eaten so quickly it is hard to capture it on camera!!!

(cooked savoury pastie)

Ingredients:

For Savoury:

• 1-2 carrot
• 1-2 zucchini
• 1 sweet potato
• 1 potato
• 1 cup green beans
• 1 cup corn kernells
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 300-500g minced beef 

For Sweet:

•  2 -3 dessert spoons of jam
• 1 apple, thinly sliced and cored
• 1 cup dried fruit (of choice)
• 1/2 cup coconut 

 (Uncooked Sweet Pastie)

Method:

Take frozen puff pastry sheets out of freezer and separate, allowing to defrost on the bench.

While pastry is defrosting, prepare savoury filling. Into a large bowl, grate carrot, zucchini, sweet potato, potato, beans and corn. Add partially defrosted minced meat. Add salt and pepper to taste. Using bare hands, thoroughly combine the savoury filling. 

Using a sharp knife, divide the mostly defrosted pastry diagonally, to create two triangles. Place a small handful of the uncooked mixture in one end of a triangle piece of pastry. Mold this to fit into the triangle shape, leaving about 1-2cm room around the edges to allow room to fold the pastry. Grab the other corner of the triangle and drag it over the filling to match the triangle shape, this is symmetrical. Press down on the folded pastry to seal the triangle shape pastie. Fold over the edges of the triangle and press again to secure (this should make sure that the pastie won't open and the contents spill). Lastly, twist the ends of the triangle, as it is just excess pastry.

Continue until all filling is used. As each pastie is made, place it on an oven tray lined with non-stick baking paper. Cook for 20-30 minutes on 180'C fan-forced.

If there is leftover pastry either cut it into triangles, as done for the savoury pasties, or leave it as a square to then fold into a rectangle (as shown in picture). Prepare a sweet filling. Smooth jam over pastry. Cover with coconut, thinly sliced apple, currants, sultanas, dried apricots and/or dates. Fold symetrically, using the same method as before, whether it is a triangle or rectangle, except, for the rectangle, cut a few slits in the sides (as shown in the photo).

Cook for 20-30 minutes at 180'C fan-forced.