pot pie

thursday night i made one of my favourite fallback recipes, veg pot pie. it's a great way to empty out the fridge as you can put just about anything in and it always comes out scrumptious. pictured here with a puff pastry crust, my preferred way to cook it is with a biscuit crust (i was being lazy). i used:

• small head of broccoli, cut into small florets and stems cut into 1/4 in. dice
• 1 russet potato, boiled whole for ~30 minutes, peeled and cut into 1/2 in. chunks
• 1 red onion, cut into 1/4 in. dice
• 2 small carrots, cut into 1/4 in. dice
• 2 stalks celery, sliced thin on the bias
• 3 cloves garlic, minced fine
• 1 habenero, minced fine
• 2 stalks tarragon, stemmed and roughly chopped
• small bunch thyme (i'm lazy and just tie it up in cotton twine and fish it out later, most of the leaves fall off while it cooks- for fancier preparations by all means stem it)
• 7 or 8 dried porcini mushrooms, soaked in hot water for half an hour and roughly chopped, soaking liquid strained and reserved
• 1 sheet puff pastry or 1 basic biscuit recipe
• wee dram of wild turkey or other bourbon (there's no actual pot in this pie, but there is some booze)
  

heat a saucepan over medium heat with enough olive oil to coat the bottom of the pan. cook the onion, celery, carrot, habenero, and garlic for about 10 minutes until translucent. add the herbs and the mushrooms and cook an additional five minutes. now if you're like me and you like pyrotechnics, add the bourbon and enjoy the fireball - it will be big (especially if you've got good high proof bourbon like old rip van winkles 107). if you have low ceilings or some special attachment to your eyebrows you may want to take the pan off the heat, add the bourbon and stir for a minute or two while the alcohol boils off before adding back to the heat. now add in the mushroom liquid, broccoli, and potatoes. you now have a choice to either boil down the sauce to your desired consistency or mash up some of the potato to thicken it. pour into a baking dish, top with your desired crust and bake at 350 f until golden brown on top and bubbling below.