Mémère's Tourtière
With our farm located 20 miles from the Canadian border, we see a lot of cultural exchange with our neighbors to the North.
As farmers and producers, we naturally care about the culinary exchange that has passed into our region. One of the tastiest winter feast dishes of the Quebec region is Tourtière: an iconic meat pie whose hearty crust and filling help us stay cozy through the long, cold winters.
It just so happens we’ve got some insiders with their roots in the region who have authentic passed-through-the-generations recipes for us to share with you. This is a cheesey twist on Mémère’s Tourtière. Its roots are in the La Motte family who hail from the Chaudière-Appalaches region just south of Quebec city.
Prep: 60 minutes minutes — Bake: 60 minutes — Assembly: 20 minutes
Yields: 2 Pies. As this is a more involved recipe, it makes sense to overproduce and save one pie for later.
Once baked, pies can be stored cold, then defrosted, before reheating at 325º F for 25 minutes.
INSTRUCTIONS
Make The Filling: To prepare the filling, place your chosen blend of meats, cloves, and diced onion into a pan and just barely cover with water. Bring the mixture to a slow simmer and cover. Let it cook over gentle heat for 30 minutes.
After the meat is mostly cooked, add diced potatoes and let them stew for about 20 minutes or until cooked (but not soft). Strain the mixture well, reserving some of the cooking liquid for later. Remove cloves (if you can find them.) Season the filling with Bell's spice blend, salt, Spicewalla nutmeg, and pepper to taste. Cover the bowl and refrigerate.
Make The Crust: Sift 3 1/2 cups of flour into a large mixing bowl. Start light on the flour and add more if necessary. Sift in the salt and baking powder.
Measure out cold lard. And by cold we mean cold. Cut the lard into the dry ingredients using a pastry cutter. Keep cutting until the mixture forms pieces the size of peas.
Begin to add cold milk, working it in little by little trying not to overwork the dough. The desired texture is lightly tacky and workable. Once the dough has come together, cover and rest in the refrigerator until you are ready to roll it. A cold dough is desirable to work with.
On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough into four evenly sized rounds of about 1/4 inch thickness.
3. Prep the Bayley: normally when it comes to topping salads with Bayley we go for a chunky crumble, but in this case, we recommend shearing off thin slices with a sharp paring knife. These leaf-like shards marble themselves in layers throughout the pie’s filling.
4. Assemble the pie: Preheat your oven to 350º F
Lay the bottom crust into a 9" pie pan. Once the filling is cool, fill the crust with a thin layer of the mixture about 3/4” thick. Layer in the leaves of Bayley over the filling. Repeat the process until the filling slightly heaps over the rim of the pie dish.
Assess the moisture content of the filling. Add a little bit of the reserved liquid. Enough to make sure the pie is nice and moist, but not so much so as to make your crust soggy. Cover with another crust and crimp the edges. Cut slits in the center.
Bake for an hour at 350º in a conventional oven. The crust should become flaky and golden brown.
INGREDIENTS
The Filling
2lb of ground beef, pork, venison, lamb, or mix
4 large red potatoes, diced
2 large onions, diced
1 teaspoon of salt
2.5 teaspoons of Bells Seasoning
1/2 teaspoon of nutmeg
3 whole cloves
1/4lb of sliced Bayley Hazen Blue
The Crust*
4 cups flour
1 cup of cold lard
1 heaping teaspoon of salt
1 1/2 teaspoons of baking powder
1 Egg
1 1/2 cups of cold milk
Flour for dusting
EQUIPMENT
Mixing bowls
2- 9” pie dishes
Rolling Pin
12+” Cast Iron Skillet
Flour sifter
*We’ve included the recipe for a traditional lard crust that Mémère makes, but as she told her grandson on the phone: “No one will make that crust like my mother made it. So don’t worry, sweetheart. If you have to buy the crusts in the box that's OK. It will come out good all the same.”
