Stilton, onion & potato pie
For my big dishes for our recent party, Nigel Slater's The Kitchen Diaries came up trumps: the creamy Stilton, Onion and Potato Pie was a hit. Given that it's ingredients list consists solely of
- Floury potatoes - 1.5kg
- Onions - 4 medium
- Butter - 80g
- Milk - 150ml
- Stilton - 225g
- Grated Parmesan - 25g
it would be virtually impossible for this dish not to be drop dead delicious. I'm not brilliant at writing out recipes, but basically, you boil the potatoes until they are soft enough to be mashed. Take the onions, peel them and cut them into segments. Fry them in a dollop of the butter until the turn golden brown and taste sweet and stunning (try not to eat them all). Heat the milk, but don't boil it. Mix the potatoes and butter together and slowly add the milk - you want to try to avoid the potatoes becoming gluey.
Nigel suggests you do the next step in a heavy frying pan, but I used a pie dish without any problems. Anyway, butter your dish well then drop in half of the mashed potato, smooth it and add the onions. Crumble over the Stilton. Add the remaining potato and smooth. Cover with the Parmesan. You're now ready to put this in a hot oven. Nigel recommends 25-30 minutes, frankly your nose will tell you when it's ready. Unfortunately I don't have any photos of it because the dish was empty within 3 minutes of it being served to the table (I was worried I'd done far too much.) This recipe serves 6, but I warn you it's popular, so make more, not less.
