The Creamiest Chicken Pot Pie! Easy Homemade Version!

Hey, welcome to Making Meals with Mika. I'm Mika, and this is all about me sharing some of my favorite meals and recipes with you. So some would be traditional soul food meals and others would be more contemporary meals that I put a little spin on. So I want to tell you a little bit about myself. I am a mother, a wife, and I work full-time at an investment firm, but what I really love to do is cook. I've always loved cooking. I would say my affinity for cooking started when I was about seven or eight when my great-grandmother, Madea, will ask for me to come to her house and help her make our holiday meals, and I love doing that. Also, I used to help my mom in the kitchen all the time. Back then, I was her sous chef. I didn't really know it was a term for it, but I would do all her prep work, cutting her bell pepper, celery, onions, grating cheeses as she made her meals. So this is my way of just sharing some of my favorite meals and recipes with you. So today, we are doing a chicken pot pie. Now, everyone loves a pot pie, especially when the temperature gets cold and you want something hearty to stick to your bones. So that's what we're going to be preparing today. Now, these are the ingredients that I use in my pot pie. We're going to start with a pound of chicken breasts, fresh onion, fresh garlic. We're using store-bought, pre-made pie crust. Now, listen, don't judge me. I am not a baker. I really don't like to bake. I love to use a store-bought crust. So this recipe, we're using store-bought crust. Now, pot pies are very versatile. You can use whatever vegetables you want to. In my pot pie, I use frozen corn, frozen peas, and I also use red potatoes with the skin on. These have been previously nuked in a microwave. That's a quick tip, and I've cut them with the skin on. Now, you can use green beans in your pot pie. You can use cooked carrots. I don't like the taste of cooked carrots, so I don't put them in my pot pie. We're also going to have six cups of stock. Now, I like bouillon because it's a richer flavor, but you can use six cups of bouillon or six cups of stock. And then this is about a half a cup of whole wheat flour and butter, a half a cup of butter as well, and this is to make our roux. So let's get started. Right now, I have the oven preheating for our pie crust. We are going to parbake the bottom part of the pie crust. That means that we're going to bake it so it can be nice and almost cooked before we put the filling on. So let's get started with that first. Now, this recipe, with the recipe I'm sharing with you, it's enough to fill up a 9 by 13 pan like this. So this recipe will fill up this whole entire pan, and this will feed a family of four or more. Now, because it's just me and my hubby, it's only two of us, we... Sorry about that. I am using this pan, which is about two quarts instead of three quarts, and I'm just going to save the leftovers for extra. So to start off, real easy, and with cooking, don't be afraid to get your fingers dirty, okay? So what I do is I'm going to butter the pan first. I'm just going to take one pat of butter, and I'm just going to go and butter the pan. Now, if you're cooking, you cannot be afraid to get your fingers dirty. So go ahead, pick the butter right up, butter your pan, and then there you go. Now, I have one of the pie crust, and it's always good to have scissors handy, kitchen scissors. Now, these have been sitting out for about, I'll say about 15 minutes, so they can get room temperature because they're going to be easier to spread like that. If you take them directly out of the refrigerator, they're going to be a little cold and you're not going to be able to spread them in your pan. So all we're going to do is unroll this pie crust. Any brand of pie crust that you like, you go ahead and use, or if you are a home baker and you are appalled that I am using store-bought pie crust, go ahead and make your own. So we're just going to put this in here, press it up the sides and the bottom, and there you go. It fits beautifully. Any extras, I just roll down. And see, look at that perfect timing. That's the timer to let me know that the oven is preheated to where I need it to be. And then I'm also going to, I'm going to poke a couple of holes at the bottom of this. This is to prevent the pie crust from bubbling up. Okay, there we go. Pie crust is warming up. Now while that is pie baking, I am going to prep my vegetables. So I love fresh onions. Now I'm going to show you a quick way and an easy way to cut your onions. So you start with a sharp knife. I'm going to cut both edges off, slice right down the middle. Now go take the first layer of this onion off. See how easy that comes off? First layer. Take all your extra good and trash. Now when I'm cutting onions, I always have to cut extra because my husband loves onions. And right now he's running the camera, so I'm going to give him a sample of these onions when I get done cutting them. You want some onion? He doesn't want any, so I'll just cut. Now normally if I cut onions, he'll come in the kitchen and be like, you didn't save me any onions, but I have his permission not to cut him any onions right now. So a quick way to dice onions, make one horizontal slice, two horizontal slice. You just hold it. I'm going to cut three vertical cuts. When you hold it, your fingertips are down. They're gripping the onion. And you just slice down. And you have beautiful diced onions. I just turn that over and I just flip slices. I'm going to do the other one the exact same way. You have beautiful diced onions. See how easy that is? Now with that little bitty piece at the end, I just flip it on its side, cut it down the middle, and then there you go. I'm going to have some extras right here. Now let me show you how to cut your garlic. I love garlic. If a recipe calls for a couple of cloves, I'll always add three or four more because I love garlic. But, so this is a head of garlic. I'm going to take a couple of cloves off, which are the individual pieces. So I'm going to use about, I'm going to be conservative, I'm going to use about, I'll say four or five because I love garlic. It's delicious. Now, a quick way of slicing your garlic. You guys, I am excessive compulsive about cleanliness. I do not like a messy workstation, so I'm constantly cleaning as I go. So here you go. You take your garlic with the rounded side up, you take your knife, you put your knife on it, you take the palm of your hand, smash it. If you're pissed off that day, come in and smash some garlic. You'll get all your little frustrations out. You smash it, but what you're doing is when you're smashing it, you're taking that outer shell, you're releasing that outer shell, and then you're also opening up the garlic and all the nice juiciness. And that's the easy way to peel your garlic. Now I'm going to do a sort of fine chop on this garlic as well. Remember your fingers are in, take your knife, put the tip of your knife on the board, and then you just go up and down. That's it. The tip of my knife is never leaving the cutting board. You just move it around, move it around, constantly scooping it back in, and there you go. Nice, nice, nice garlic. So I'm going to use this when I'm making the roux for the pot pie, the filling for the pot pie. Now I'm going to chop my chicken. Now this is just for time purposes. I have a separate knife, and then I'm going to chop my chicken. Now, you always need to chop your chicken on a different cutting board as your fresh vegetables. I like to use these kind of flexible plastic cooking pads, I mean chopping pads, because they're easy washable. You can throw them away if they get old. So with the chicken, I'm going to do this. I put my hand over the chicken breast. I'm going to go in with a sharp knife, and I'm going to cut horizontally. You see that? And then, if you guys notice, there's these little lines on the chicken. It just automatically happens. I slice with those lines. Now the reason why I cut this in half is because it gives me, although I have the same amount of chicken, it gives me more pieces. Now, if you want great big chunks of chicken in your pot pie, you don't have to slice it in half. I like the chicken to be rationed. Now also, now that I've cut them into little strips, I'm taking each of these strips, and I'm making additional cuts in them. You can do them all at once, but chicken is slippery, so safety is best. I find it hard to cut more than three or four pieces at once, and I'm going to do the same with this. And here's the next one. This one is huge, so I'll take my hand, hold it down. I'm going to slice it horizontally, and like I said, all this does is it gives you more pieces of chicken because I like to have a piece of chicken in every single bite of my pot pie. All right, got all those cut. I'll turn them sideways, and I'll start dicing. Now feel free to cut your chicken even smaller if you want. I do like a nice bite of chicken, so I don't want these real itty-bitty. I want it nice and hearty. Now, you don't have to use chicken breast. I like chicken breast because it has the least amount of fat. Now, if you want a little bit more flavor in your pot pie, go ahead and use some chicken thighs. I love chicken thighs. Chicken thighs are very versatile. You can use boneless, skinless chicken thighs, and it's going to give you a little bit more flavor. Chicken thighs do have a different texture than chicken breast, so be prepared for that, but by any means, use whatever cut of chicken that you prefer. I just prefer chicken breast in my pot pie, and that is your cubed chicken. Now, I have chicken hands, so I have to go wash my hands before we go to the next step. Okay, so now that the chicken is all cubed, it's time to cook our chicken. So I have a pot that's been preheating, and I'm going to put about two tablespoons of olive oil in this pot, so it should be nice and hot. Now, I'm going to drop the chicken directly into this pot, and you'll hear that nice sizzle. Oh, that lets you know that the pot is nice and hot. Now, I like to season my chicken when it's in the pot, and I use an array of different seasonings. Don't let anyone season shame you. I mean, I use anywhere from Great Value to McCormick to Kirkland. I use an array of seasonings, and there has never been a time where someone tasted my food, and they were like, wait a minute. Is this Great Value? Is this Great Value pepper? Because I prefer McCormick's pepper. It's never going to happen, so use whatever seasoning fits your budget. I use an array of them, but for my chicken, I'm going to put some black pepper in here, and the key to delicious food is season as you go. I can't tell you how much black pepper I'm putting in here. You have to use your senses. One is you have to look to see if it's enough. You have to smell it, and then finally, you have to taste it. I just put some garlic powder, and then I'm going to use a little salt, and then the key to my pot pie is I like to put some thyme in there. What the thyme does is it gives it that nice homey feeling, and it makes it seem like your food has been cooking for hours, so a little thyme goes into my chicken as well. Once again, I can't tell you the approximate measurements. I'll try to approximate in the recipe, and the recipe will be listed in the comments below. Now, you're going to constantly stir your chicken to make sure it's getting even cook time, so you're probably going to cook this for about, I'll say about eight to ten minutes depending on the size chunks that you cut your chicken into, and you want this to be well done. That means absolutely no pink in the center. We cannot have pink chicken. Even though you're going to put it in the oven later to bake it, no pink chicken. So, I'll come back after this is done to show you what your chicken should look like, and then we'll go on to the next steps. Okay, the magic of TV and video. So, after about 10 minutes, my chicken chunks look like this, and these are nice and done. So, what you're going to do is, I'm just going to take the chicken. I'm going to turn the heat down on this pot a little bit. I have it on like a medium heat. I'm going to turn the heat down. I'm going to take the chicken. I'm going to place it on my plate because I need this pot for something else. Now, inside of this pot is the remnants of the chicken flavoring, all the seasonings that you use to season your chicken, and we want that. Now, what we're going to do is, we are going to start the base of the filling for the pot pie. Now, I am going to use a couple of tablespoons of butter, and I am going to saute my onions and garlic. Now, have you ever tried to cook onions and garlic together, and you realized that your garlic was burning? Well, that means that you're putting your garlic in too soon, or your eye is too high. So, when I saute my onions and garlic, I always put onions in first, and I let them get nice, translucent, which is almost clear, and I let them get soft, and then I put in my garlic. So, right now, I just added one entire onion to this pot. Now, remember, this pot still had all the seasonings from our chicken, so this is going to be a nice, flavorful pot pie. The most important thing when you're cooking is making sure your food is seasoned well, not over-seasoned, but seasoned to perfection, and the only way you're going to know that is by constantly tasting your food and making sure that it's to your liking. I'm going to turn the heat up on these onions. I'm going to keep the camera focused on this pot because I want you to see what your onions should look like before you add your garlic, and then we're going to make our roux directly in this pot with the onions and the garlic, and right now, this is already smelling good. I mean, think about it. Onions in a pot with melted butter, with seasonings. Oh, my goodness, this smells delicious. Now, you see I'm constantly stirring. When you're cooking, you have to be paying attention. You can't put some onions in the pot and go watch TV or go take a phone call. It is an all senses on deck event, so you have to constantly monitor your pans, constantly stir to make sure everything is cooking properly. All right, so now we're to the point where you see the onions. They're a little transparent. Not all the way. They're a little transparent. They're a little softer. You can start smelling. You can smell it. Like I said, use your senses so I can visually see that the onions are softer. I smell their aroma. They're giving off that nice, sweet flavor. Now, I could taste them if I want to, but I'm not going to do it. Now, this is the time where I'm going to turn the heat down just a little bit. I was at medium high. I'm going to turn it to more like a medium, and then I'm going to add my fresh garlic. Now, fresh garlic and onion simmering in butter is one of the best flavors in the whole entire world. Now, it is very imperative that you constantly stir this pot with the garlic in here because garlic will burn in a heartbeat. If you turn your back around, your garlic will be black. Can't do it. Can't have black garlic. Now, there is something called black garlic, which is absolutely delicious. I have some in my cover right now, and it's used for different dishes, but black garlic does not taste like regular garlic. It's more sweet. The point is, we don't want this garlic to burn or scorch. Now, it's smelling. Oh, this is delicious. Absolutely delicious. Okay. Now, while this is cooking, I'm going to get the butter and the flour ready for the roux. Now, this roux, you can basically use as a base for any of your gravy. Your gravy starts with a nice roux, and what a roux is, is equal amounts of butter and flour that has been cooked over the stove. Now, are you running into a problem where you're trying to make gravy, and it's lumpy, and you don't understand why? The reason why it's lumpy is because you don't have equal amounts of butter and flour. So, if you're ever trying to make a roux, and it's too lumpy, add a little bit more butter, and it will smooth it right on out. All right. So, this, see, my garlic is starting to brown. This lets me know it's time to move on to the next step. Now, this is very important. So, I am using a quarter cup of flour for this roux, and what the roux does is it thickens the filling for your pot pie. So, what I'm going to do is, I'm going to put a quarter cup of butter in my pot. I know it seems like a lot, but it's delicious. This is necessary. Butter is delicious. So, now that that's melted, I'm going to put a quarter cup of flour in my pot as well, and then I'm going to stir, and then you'll see it become like a little paste until all the butter melts. Now, this is something that you have to use your senses for. If this was too thick and it wasn't moving around, then I would know that I need more butter. Now, because I'm using whole wheat flour, I'm going to have to cook this a little bit extra because you don't want a floury taste in your filling. That's terrible. You don't want that. So, this is going to smell, you hear people say, oh, it's a nutty, it's a nutty flavor. You're going to cook this until you get like a nutty flavor. Seriously, constantly stir, constantly stir, constantly stir. You want to add a little bit more flour because it was a little too buttery. Now, I'm keeping the camera on this pot because it's important for you to see how your roux should look. I'm going to just let that simmer. Okay, so I've let this roux cook for about 10 minutes, and now this is what it looks like when the roux is done. Yes, you have to cook it for that long to make sure you're cooking that flour. No one wants a raw flour taste in their filling. So, this is what it's going to look like, and now here comes the fun part. Now, we are going to whisk your chicken broth or chicken stock into this pot. Now, you're going to turn your eye down just a little bit, and then what I do is I start with small amounts, and this is what you're going to do to ensure that you have a nice, smooth consistency, and as it gets thicker, I add more. I'm going to continue to whisk. Now, this is six cups of chicken stock is what I have. Can you see that filling starting to take shape? Keep whisking, and I like to turn the pot too. I mean, that's just my technique. That's not a scientific technique at all. It's just something that I do as I'm whisking. So, I add this in like fourths, constant whisking, making sure all of that roux is incorporated into my stock. Okay, and then my final. Once you add everything, this should be the consistency. You see, it's a little thicker than a soup, but not as thick as a gravy. You see that? This is gorgeous. This is the consistency you're looking for. Nice and thick, but still very movable. Okay, so my filling base is at the consistency that I want it to be, and now it's time to season my base. Now, I already have onion and garlic in here, but I'm going to add some black pepper, you know, maybe a teaspoon, and what did I say my secret ingredient was? Thyme. Add a little thyme, and then we'll stir. Now, it's important to taste, constantly taste, constantly taste, to make sure your flavors are where you want them to be. So, I have my trusty spoon right here, going for a little taste. That consistency is perfect. Tastes delicious. Oh, that's good. Now, you notice I didn't add any salt, because my bouillon already has salt in it, and I did not add any garlic powder, because it already has where you're going to get it. Now, here is, now it's time to add your mix-ins, whatever you want for your filling. So, I'm going to add my corn, and this is about a cup and a half of frozen corn. I'm going to add that. Okay, I'm going to add my peas. I love sweet peas. If you don't like peas, it's okay. You don't have to put them in your pot pie. Put my peas in here, and then I'm going to add my red skin potatoes with the skin on. It's something about that skin on that makes it delicious, and then, of course, I'm going to add the chicken. Okay, I'm going to tell you a secret. Remember earlier I said that this is going to be a little thicker than a soup, but thinner than a gravy? My husband, he always asks me to make extra, because he actually likes this as a soup, and then the next day when we're eating, when we're eating this pot pie as leftovers, you know, sometimes the filling can dry out a little bit. So, the best thing to do is the part that I have put over, I have saved for him as his soup. He just pours it right back into the leftover pot pie, and then he has all the richness and the gooeyness of the filling. So, this is good to eat by itself. Now, what you're going to do is you're going to turn this up and just let all these flavors just marinate together, and you might need to season it a little bit more. I just put, you know, vegetables and things in here, so I know I'm not going to add any more salt just yet. I know I need a little bit more pepper. How do I know that? Because I've made this a thousand times, and I can just tell by looking at it, I need a little bit more pepper. Put a little bit more thyme. Good catch. Good catch Then I'm just going to let this come to a boil. When you put the cold vegetables in there, although they've been sitting out, you know, for about a half an hour or so, when you put the cold vegetables in there, it's going to bring the temperature down of your filling. So, once this comes to a boil, I know that it's time to fill my pie crust. I don't think I showed you guys the parboiled crust, the par-baked crust. I'm sorry. So, this is what your crust is going to look like when you're ready to put the fillings on there. It's nice and golden, crispy, and it's par-baked. That means that it's not all the way baked, but it's baked just long enough. When you put this hot filling on there, it won't disintegrate. You'll have that nice bottom crust. I don't know about you, but when I'm eating a pie pie, I like the crust on the bottom and on the top. Give me all the crust. So, when this comes to a boil, we are going to fill our pie crust. Okay, so my pot pie filling has reached the boil. The flavors are all delicious, and now it's time to transfer this into my dish so I can bake it. Now, typically, we use a ladle, or I don't want to pour it in here because you don't want the splash. So, I normally use a ladle, and I realized I couldn't find my ladle. So, a measuring cup is going to have to do. So, let me turn this off, and all you're going to do is you're going to dip the filling out of the pie onto your crust. Don't be shy. Don't be stingy. Now, like I said, this is enough to fill up a 9 by 13 baking pan. So, mine is a little bit less than that, so I'm not going to use all of this filling, but my husband loves that anyway because he likes to use the filling the next day. And, you know, I just move it around. I got too much too much chicken on one end. Chicken in mine. Just for the chicken. Put some of that in there. That is all filled. Let's turn it off. Now, we are going to top this beautiful pot pie with our top crust. Here it is. Now, the crust does shrink when you're cooking, so you might want to pull it a little bit and let it stretch. You can even use a rolling pin. Like I said, I'm not a baker, and I used to have a rolling pin, but when I moved, I sold everything. I gave it away, and I gave my rolling pin away, so I just stretch it like this. That's fine. We're going to lay this top crust over the top. It's okay if it runs over because it's going to shrink anyway. You can pinch off the excess if you want. I never throw away the excess crust. You hear me? This crust is delicious. So, what we're going to do is we're going to take this excess. I'm just going to put it on the ends like that, okay? A little extra piece. I'm using that. I'm using all of the crust, and I've kind of pushed it down on the edges of the pan. Now, another important thing is you're going to take a knife. I'm just going to score it right in the middle. This allows for steam to escape. I put three little slits right down the middle. Now, listen. I'm about to get fancy on y'all. I'm about to get fancy. I'm also going to top this with an egg wash. What an egg wash is is basically just an egg, just beaten, and then you're just going to top it. You're going to spread it on your crust so it can be nice and golden brown. Now, I told you guys earlier I'm not a baker, so I don't even have a pastry brush. So, don't judge me. Don't judge me, but even if you don't have a pastry brush, you can just take a paper towel. What I've done is I folded it. I'm going to fold it again, right? I know. Don't judge me. I know some bakers are out there clutching their pearls. I'm sorry. I'll get me a pastry brush next time. You just dip it in your egg wash and just go over your pie, your pie crust. That's it. This is going to be nice and golden brown. When this is done, you're not going to even know that I put the egg wash on here with a paper towel. You don't want to know. You don't want to know. All right. Now, I'm going to put this in the oven. Now, let me tell you how long you cook this. Now, your filling is essentially done. Everything in here is done. So, we're going to cook this for about 15 minutes, 15 to 20 minutes, depending on how long it takes for the pie crust to bake. Now, I have the oven at 375. This pie crust said bake at 450, but I want this to bake slower than that. So, this is going to take about 20 minutes. And then when it's done, I'll show you the finished product. Okay. So, my pot pie is out of the oven. It cooked for about 15 to 17 minutes. I took it out when the crust got nice and golden brown. And you see it's nice and shiny. That's because of the egg wash that we put on at the end. So, I'm going to dig into this and show you the umptiousness that's in the middle of this. And I'm just going to take a big, giant spoonful of this out. Now, look at that. I'm getting all of this crust, the top and the bottom crust. You see that? That is what it should look like. See this? Dig deep in there. Get that ooey, gooey center out. Ooh, that's delicious. I'm getting it all. For me, the more crust, the better. And I love how the center just oozes out. That lets you know that you have a nice, juicy pot pie. Now, the only thing left is to taste. You see this? So, the only thing left is to taste this. I do want to turn this around so you guys can see. Look at that. That's just gorgeous. That is gorgeous. So, let me go ahead and try this deliciousness. So, with me, I get the crust. I'm going to get a little bit of the potatoes, the chicken, the juice. Got to blow it. I'm not trying to burn the roof of my mouth. This is scrumptious. That's delicious. So, I hope you enjoyed your first meal that you made with Mika. Tune in next time where I'll be sharing another one of my favorite recipes. Have a good day.