The weeknight version, with good bought all-butter puff
No folding, no overnight fridge. Two sheets of shop-bought all-butter puff, a quick pan filling, a short freezer chill, and flat peppery pies on the table in under two hours.
Quick answer
For a quick Oven Marvel-style pie, fry diced chicken thigh in butter until it reaches 75 C, make a peppery bechamel in the same pan with onion, carrot, potato and peas, and freeze it in a thin layer for 20 minutes. Cut 12 cm rounds from two sheets of chilled all-butter puff, fill, seal, chill 15 minutes, and bake at 200 C for 25 to 30 minutes.
Home recreation This is my own attempt, guided by published descriptions of the shop's pies. Oven Marvel never published its recipe. It is one of my Oven Marvel recipe recreations, and the recreation log shows how each one got here.
Ingredients
Pastry
Quick filling
Method
Simmer the potato and carrot together in salted water for 6 minutes, until just tender. Drain.
Melt 10 g of the butter in a wide pan over a medium heat. Add the chicken in one layer and cook, turning, for 6 to 8 minutes until no longer pink and at least 75 C inside. Do not brown it hard. Tip onto a plate with its juices.
Lower the heat, add the remaining butter and the onion, and soften for 4 minutes. Stir in the flour and cook for 1 minute. Gradually whisk in the milk and stock and simmer for 2 minutes after it thickens. Add half the white pepper.
Fold in the chicken and its juices, the potato, carrot and frozen peas, the sugar, the rest of the pepper and salt to taste. Spread thinly on a plate or tray and freeze for 20 minutes, then move it to the fridge until cold to the touch.
Heat the oven to 200 C (fan 180 C) with a baking tray inside. Unroll the cold pastry and cut four 12 cm rounds from one sheet for the bases and four 13 cm rounds from the other for the lids. A small bowl and a sharp knife work well.
Put the bases on baking paper. Add about 140 g of cold filling to each, flattened to 1.5 cm high with a 1.5 cm border. Wet the border, add the lids, press out air and seal with a fork. Cut a small slit in each top.
Freeze the pies on their paper for 15 minutes, until the pastry is firm.
Brush the tops thinly with the yolk, avoiding the edges. Slide the paper onto the hot tray and bake for 25 to 30 minutes until deep golden and crisp underneath. Rest for 10 minutes before eating.
When should I make this version?
When it is Wednesday, you want the pie, and you do not have a day. This recipe keeps the things that matter most, the butter, the flat shape, the peppery cream filling, and skips the lamination and overnight chilling. It loses some of the soft, chewy inner layer that home-made rough puff gives, which is why I score it lower. It is still the recipe I make most often.
Why does the pastry have to be all butter?
Because butter is the flavour people remember. Leslie Tay picked out the smell of butter rather than margarine in Oven Marvel’s pastry (ieatishootipost, 2013), and nothing else in a chicken pie is as noticeable. Many shop-bought puff pastries use vegetable fats. They are cheaper and easier to handle, and they taste of very little. Read the ingredients list and look for butter as the only fat. It costs more and it is worth it here.
How do I keep bought puff from going soggy?
Bought pastry is thinner and more even than home-made, so it puffs beautifully but has less margin for error against a wet filling. Three habits help:
- Cold filling, always. The freezer chill in step four is not optional. Warm filling turns the base to paste.
- A hot tray underneath. Preheating the tray sends heat straight into the base.
- Do not overfill. About 140 g per 12 cm pie. More, and the seal bursts.
Is the chicken cooked safely?
Yes, if you check. Pieces of thigh cooked over a medium heat for 6 to 8 minutes should reach 75 C at the centre. Cut the largest piece open or use a probe thermometer. The filling then goes into the pie fully cooked, so the bake only has to heat it through. Do not leave the filling sitting on the counter while you get on with other things: cooked food in a warm kitchen enters the danger zone quickly (Singapore Food Agency), which is one more reason for the freezer chill.
How does it compare with the flagship?
| Weeknight | Flagship | |
|---|---|---|
| Pastry | Bought all-butter puff | Home-made all-butter rough puff |
| Chicken | Pan-cooked thigh | Gently poached thigh |
| Sauce liquid | Milk and bought stock | Milk and poaching liquid |
| Time | About 1 hr 50 min | About 7 hours, mostly chilling |
| Closeness, my opinion | 6 out of 10 | 8 out of 10 |
Can I freeze these?
Yes, unbaked. Freeze the sealed, unglazed pies on a tray, then bag them. Bake from frozen at 200 C for 35 to 40 minutes, glazing after the first 10 minutes, and check the centre is at least 75 C. Baked pies can be frozen too; see reheating puff pastry pies for how to bring them back without a soggy base.
Where next?
When you have a free Saturday, try the full flagship recreation with home-made rough puff. The difference is mostly in that inner layer, and once you have tasted it, the weeknight version starts to feel like a sketch of the real drawing.
Questions people ask
Which bought puff pastry should I use?
An all-butter one. Check the ingredients list: butter should be the only fat. Many puff pastries use vegetable fats, which bake up crisp but lack the butter flavour that defined Oven Marvel's pastry.
Can I make one big pie instead?
Yes. Use a 22 cm shallow tin, line it with one sheet and top with the other. Bake at 200 C for 35 to 40 minutes, checking that the centre reaches 75 C.
Sources for this page
Every source we used, with notes on what each one says: sources and further reading.
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