Chicken Pot Pie
Bummer Alert. There’s actually not “pot” in chicken pot pie. So, you’re not going to get high on this… unless you mean high on deliciousness! Oh dear. Perhaps a Bad Joke Alert would have been in order, too.
chicken pot pie video – scroll down for recipe
I made this pot pie from scratch, all the way up from the bottom. Some shortcuts you may want to apply would be using leftover chicken or turkey, buying a rotisserie chicken and stripping it, or even using canned chicken (do they still sell that?) and using store bought stock (or maybe you have some homemade stock already in your freezer?). If you want a two-crust pie, make sure you have enough dough. Double this recipe for pie crust, or buy some. Often, though, pot pies only have a top crust — make sure to cut vent holes in it if you don’t do a lattice crust like I did or it will cause problems. The benefit of only having a top crust (along with fewer calories per serving) is that the pie won’t need to bake as long, maybe only 30 minutes.
An even simpler way to make a pot pie is to put the filling into a casserole dish, then top with squares of biscuit dough and bake.
This recipe makes enough filling for two deep-dish pie pans or one 9×13″ pan. When filling the pans, leave about 1/2″ at the top to allow for expansion and help prevent bubble-overs. Just in case of bubble-overs, though, I recommend putting a cookie sheet on the rack under the pie to catch any spills before they burn onto your oven floor, creating carbon stalagmites.
chicken pot pie recipe – from scratch
PrintChicken Pot Pie
- Yield: 12 1x
Ingredients
- 1 2-3 pound chicken (or 2–3 pounds chicken parts, bone-in)
- 4 cups water
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 teaspoon salt
- Pie crust for 1 or 2-crust pie or 1 batch of biscuit dough
- 1/2 cup (4 ounces) butter
- 1 onion, diced (about a cup)
- 1 carrot, sliced
- 2 stalks celery, sliced
- 1 ear of corn, kernels (about 1/2 cup corn kernels)
- 1/2 cup flour
- 1 teaspoon dried sage
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
- 1 tablespoon fresh parsley, optional
Instructions
- Set your oven to 400ºF.
- Cut up the chicken and put in a large pot with the water, bay leaf, and salt. Boil 1 hour until tender. (Alternately, cook 20 minutes in a pressure cooker). Remove the chicken to a plate to cool, reserving the cooking liquid. When the chicken is cool enough to handle, pull off the meat, discarding the skin and bones.
- In another pot, saute the vegetables briefly in 4 tablespoons butter until beginning to soften, or about 5 minutes. Remove and set aside.
- In the same pot, melt the remaining butter and make a roux with the 1/2 cup flour.
- Add about a cup of the cooking liquid and incorporate into the roux by whisking. Add the rest of the liquid slowly, whisking constantly to remove lumps until you have a smooth sauce.
- Add the sage and pepper and simmer about 5 minutes, or until the sauce has thickened. Turn off heat.
- Prepare your baking pans, either 2 pie pans or one 9×12 dish, lining with pie crust if you like a 2-crust pie.
- Layer the vegetables, chicken, parsley, then carefully pour the sauce over. Do not overfill; leave 1/2″ or so from the rim of the dish to allow for bubbling over.
- Top with pie crust or biscuit squares or rounds. If using a solid pie crust, cut a few slashes in it to vent.
- Bake for 30-45 minutes until golden brown.
- Let cool 20 minutes before serving.
30 Comments
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(Off on a Tangent: My mother once told me that we are related distantly to Mrs. Budd, but I keep mentally blocking how we are related to her. I do know she’s from my home town, though. Nevertheless, I have made chicken pot pie from scratch not very often, and I am sure her recipes were not transmitted through our common genes.)
Your recipe looks outstanding. Twelve servings is way too much for my wife and me, so this quantity would have to be for company. The recipe appears very forgiving — shrinkable and stretchable — so I am sure I can make it for two with leftovers for the next day. Lots of questions: How freezable would it be with the crust? Would you freeze it unbaked or baked? Then, would you thaw it first or could it be baked from frozen?
I have never heard of Mrs. Budd’s brand!
I think — think, as I have not tested this — that it would work best to line a pan with foil, make your pie, wrap the foil up over the top, freeze it. Once it’s frozen, take it out of the pan and wrap it up really tight with more foil or plastic, then refreeze. When you’re ready, you could uncover the top and plop it back into the pan you initially froze it in, then bake, adding another 20-30 minutes to the cook time (and maybe re-covering the top with foil if it starts to get too brown half way through). There’s nothing in the filling that shouldn’t freeze just fine.
Great show and one damn fine lookin’ pie! I’m going to try a veggie version.
Dude. Diane. Yes. Put some taters innit!
Just made the Pot Pie, Hilah.. did the biscuit dough crust and “janky” lattice. Forgot to put roux in first before crust went on top…Meh!! I added some crushed garlic in the mix for a flavorful aromatic treat. Photo is on your #hilahcooking 🙂
Awesome! It looks great, Anson. Better than mine, for sure. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for sharing your wonderful cooking tips with us. Would it be possible to substitute the butter for olive oil. You know, in Spain we never use butter for cooking. Olive oil is healthier and I think it should work fine. What do you think?
¡Gracias!
¡Hola!
That would work perfectly fine for the filling. Thanks for writing!
Dude, love your damn cooking, I’ve made numerous of your recipes and I must say that it helps an amateur cook like me make a good meal. Thanks alot for your videos man, I live with too many guys so i’m always looking for new recipes to keep them off my back haha. Anyways thanks again for the recipes and vids.
Hooray, Heather! I’m so happy my recipes are working for you! You should be proud. Chicken pot pie is no beginners recipe! 🙂
Have you ever done any dutch oven cooking? Like ya know.. outside? Do you think all or most of your recipes would work? Found your site yesterday. I do some wilderness cooking and am always looking for easy stuff to cook for 16 or so people.
Love your methods?!?
d
Hi Dave!
My experience with outside cookery is quite limited, but I have been to a few dutch oven cookoffs. I think my beer beef stew recipe would work, or the “Vampire-fighting” pork stew on the site. I bet the peach cobbler would work great, too. Surely there are others, chicken pot pi being one. Might want to just do a top biscuit crust for that? You’d probably know better than me, though! 🙂
You could always move/go to Colorado….. we are still looking for a good cook on the Grand trip next year, interested??
dp
That would be an adventure! Are dogs allowed? 😉
No dogs allowed, but maybe another river closer and shorter?/
?
See YA
Hi Hilah,
Love discovering your cooking videos! I’d like to make the casserole version with biscuits for a teachers’ appreciation luncheon. Can I prepare all the ingredients the day before (when I have the time to prep), refrigerate all parts, and then assemble and bake the next morning? Any advice to make sure this works well? Thanks!
Hey Chris!
That sounds like a great idea. I think it would work fine to make the filling, put it into your casserole dish, cool, cover and refrigerate. Biscuit dough can be made ahead of time and wrapped tightly in plastic and refrigerated.
In the morning, get the filling out so it gets the chill off. Roll and cut your biscuits. Bake for an additional 10 minutes to account for the cold filling. If the biscuits start to get too brown, lay a sheet of foil over the top while they bake.
I hope everyone enjoys it!
Well know. I have been around this net foodie stuff for 15 years. I have seen a few recipes for homemade Pot Pies. It is something I want to try some time. But here in the upper midwest, too damn hot now to think about that. I have looked for individual disposable pot pie bowls and can’t find any that are oven and microwave safe. I do see those small tin kind that Swansons and Banquet use, but I want to be able to reheat them at work. And all we have is a microwave. So those tin ones are out. So I have tried, really I have. I just can not find the right equipment.
I promise that once the weather cools down to like 40 degrees or so, I will use the corning ware cereal bowls and make a few individual ones.
Come October, I gotta get some cold weather foods made. I can make my chili and pot pies at the same time. Don’t ask how many cookers I have to make chili. I have a 1.5 qt, 4 qt, 6 qt and 18 qt cookers. Probably can not use them all at the same time. Might trip a breaker or 2 !!!
Now you have given me an idea. Great !!!!! Thanks ..
Hi Harold!
I hope it’s cooled down a little finally for you, and you are able to get those crock pots to work! Using a corning ware bowl for individual pies is a great idea. You could even freeze them, I bet. Let us know how it goes!
This pie is suuuuch a treat. When I make this, we are eating dinner and dessert! I love it!
I have a question… How could I freeze it? So far I have been making extra filling and freezing the filling only. That saves some time. Can the whole pie be frozen without losing wonderful texture?
Thank you Hilah
Hi Christina!
I am super happy to hear this! What a great way to think about it, too — dinner and dessert — I love it! 🙂
As far as freezing, I honestly have not tried it with this recipe, but since you have frozen the filling with no problems you should be able to freeze it like any fruit pie. I was worried that the filling might get grainy after freezing, so thank you for letting me know it works! Here is how to freeze a pie:
To avoid having to lose all your pie pans to the freezer, line then with plastic wrap then assemble the pie as usual (crust, filling, crust) and cover with plastic wrap.
Freeze raw pie several hours until completely solid.
Remove pie from pan and re-wrap the whole pie tightly in foil. Store in freezer until ready to use.
When ready to cook, unwrap frozen pie, place back into original pie pan and bake as directed. Do NOT thaw first, just add an extra 20-30 minutes to cook time of pie. If the top crust begins to get too brown towards the end, lay a sheet of foil on top.
If you don’t mind keeping the pan/pie together in the freezer, just assemble the pie as normal, then wrap with plastic or foil and freeze. Use a metal pie pan that can stand up to the temperature change (frozen to oven) without cracking like a glass pan could do.
Hope that helps! Thanks for writing!
Oh yes, and the recipe is a 5 star!
Great recipe Hilah! LoL, at Daisy eating the pot pie, i hope she doesn’t get high…
Thanks, Dontay! Dude, I’m telling you that dog can eat _anything_! And she will. 🙂
I cannot tell you how glad I am to have found you, Hilah! Cooking has always interested me but I’ve been too intimidated to try much of anything from scratch. It’s a cold, rainy day in NC today so homemade chicken pot pie sounded perfect. I also used your pie crust recipe (first time I’ve ever attempted homemade pie crust). You made it so easy to do with your tips. And the very best part of all is that the filling obviously is a pretty forgiving recipe because I was a bit of a hot mess in the kitchen and made several mistakes along the way….but it still came out AMAZING! Even my little girls scarfed it up. Score! 🙂
Thank you, this is the best EVER!! I was ready to give up, ill never make a delicious chicken pot pie from scratch.. you are amazing, thank you for all the time you’ve spent sharing.. this is absolutely the best I have ever made, love it so much that I make this pie several times a month during the winter months.
Great job!!
That makes me so glad, Sheila! 🙂
Just made this recipe for my little southern grandma and it was a success! Thanks so much, Hilah 🙂 You da bomb
Can we bake the bottom crust for like 10 – 15 mins before adding the chicken filling?
Hi Nimra, I guess you could. Probably need to poke a few holes in it first and bake about 10 mins