Le chocolat chaud (parisian hot chocolate)

Chocolat chaud, or hot chocolate is consumed across the world and all hot chocolate lovers should know not to buy the powdered hot chocolate that you just add hot milk to! Honestly, there is no point in having those rubbish hot chocolates (if you can call them hot chocolates at all) when a nice one can be made in 5 minutes! Follow this very simple recipe to make your own very delicious chocolat chaud! 

Ingredients 

• Milk (full fat or semi-skimmed)
• single cream
• Plain cooking chocolate
• Milk cooking chocolate
• granulated sugar (optional)
• A small saucepan 

1. Fill 3/4 of your mug with milk and then top up ALMOST to the top with single cream (with maybe 2-3cm spare)
2. Pour milk and cream into a saucepan and put it over low heat
3. When it starts to steam up, put the plain and milk chocolates into the hot milk. How much you need depends on your mug size. BUT, I think the golden ratio is 5:1 plain chocolate to milk chocolate. So let's say you are using 30g plain chocolate, then you will use 6g milk chocolate
4. For a mug roughly to the one I used in the picture, you will need about 25g plain chocolate and 5g milk chocolate 
5. Stir the mixture with a wooden spoon or plastic whisk continuously until the chocolates have all melted, this should be fairly quick, my chocolates were melted within 30 seconds. But you want to keep whisking until the texture turns smooth, which will take another minute or two
6. Now pour the chocolat chaud into your mug and voila! Your delicious hot chocolate! I actually put in half a tsp of sugar at this point as I like my hot chocolate quite sweet, but this is completely optional!

Link to recipe of the soufflé in this photo: http://bakingscience.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/lemon-and-citrus-honey-souffle.html

Mixed fruit genoise cake

This cake is not special, and I mean it's NOT special at all. There's nothing new about this cake when compared to the rest of the blog posts. But I think there is a take home message from this, don't use mango to make mousseline, it just doesn't work! Most of the mango flavour goes when heated and you are just left with a sour-ish custard! I had to resort to shoving lots of mango chunks into the filling to make it mango-y. 

This recipe is for an 8 inch cake tin. 

Ingredients (genoise sponge)

• 110g self raising flour
• 110g caster sugar
• 4 medium eggs
• 45g unsalted butter

1. Line an 8 inch baking tin with parchment and pre-heat oven to 180 degrees C
2. Measure flour and set aside
3. Heat butter until melted and set aside to cool down for at least 20 minutes
4. Beat sugar and eggs together in a large mixing bowl briefly
5. Now whisk eggs with an electric whisk over a pan of simmering water until it has more than doubled in volume and when whisk is lifted off the batter, it leaves a thin trail behind
6. Fold in flour and butter separately, careful not to lose too much volume in the cake batter
7. Bake for 35-40 minutes, it's done with a knife comes out clean (start preparing mousseline during baking)
8. Cool in tin for 5 minutes and then take cake out to cool down completely

Ingredients (mango mousseline)

• 450g mango chunks
• 30g caster sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 4 tbsps corn flour (about 20-25g)

1. Puree the mango chunks and heat the puree over low heat
2. Beat sugar and eggs together until smooth
3. Add corn flour to eggs and beat again until smooth
4. When puree starts to simmer, add a tbsp to your egg mixture and whisk, then add another tbsp and repeat the whisking, continue until the paste starts to get runny
5. Pour the egg flour mix into the rest of the puree and continue whisking to prevent the eggs from cooking and put it on low heat until it boils, again continue whisking throughout
6. When it boils, continue heating and whisking for 2 more minutes and the mixture should thicken considerably
7. Take the mousseline off the heat and let it cool to room temperature

Assembly

1. Cut genoise sponge horizontally into 2 halves
2. Pipe 2/3 of mousseline into the middle of the sponges as filling, don't try to spread this, it's too thick for spreading I think, you'll risk breaking the delicate sponge if you attempt to spread it too hard
3. Use the remaining mousseline and fruits such as melon, remaining mango and strawberries to decorate the top

Special tips

I really would avoid using mango for the mousseline, the flavour just goes, not diminishes, it goes pretty much completely. Try using another fruit, I've tried melon before and that's fine, I reckon pineapple would be ok too. Try not to use canned fruits, as the resulting mousseline just don't taste as nice! 

chocolate and strawberry mousse chiffon cake

This is just like the previous chiffon I've blogged about. It's a light and airy cake (if it rises well) and I think it's an absolutely delight. Though I admit I find the chocolate chiffon harder to make than the lemon one. Maybe I'll try a different recipe for this next time, but for now, this works well! So, this is a chocoalte chiffon, with a thick supportive layer of strawberry mousse in the middle, lots of ganache on top and chocolate bits around the side. My piping is rubbish as per always, but it says  "Congratulations Dr Gammons" for a friend who will be passing her PhD viva today (SO EXCITED for her actually). 

Ingredients (Chocolate chiffon)

• 125g self raising flour
• 150g + 50g caster sugar (in separate bowls)
• 4 egg yolks
• 5 egg whites
• 80ml vegetable oil
• 50ml cold water
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 25g coco powder

1. Grease 23cm (9 inch) baking tin with butter and pre-heat oven to 170 degrees C
2. Sift and mix flour, coco powder, baking powder and 150g caster sugar together
3. Add water, oil and egg yolks to the mix and whisk until smooth
4. Now beat the egg whites until foamy, then add 1 tbsp of the remaining 50g caster sugar at a time to it until it forms soft peaks and glossy
5. Add 1/3 of meringue to cake mix and fold it in, then add the rest of the egg whites to it and gently fold in the rest 
6. Pour cake mix into baking tin (put it as close to tin as possible to prevent the batter dropping from a great height, this should help to keep some of the air in)
7. (I melted the dark chocolate and piped it to form the side structure onto a baking parchment at this stage and put it into the fridge to set)
8. Bake for 60-70 minutes, it should almost double in height and when tested with a clean skewer, it should come out clean as per usual 
9. Tip the tin upside down with cake inside and let it cool upside down on a wire rack for 40 minutes
10. When it has cooled, cut it horizontally into 2 equal sponges

Ingredients (strawberry mousse)

• 250g strawberries
• 150ml double cream
• 30g caster sugar
• 30g corn flour

1. Puree the strawberries 
2. Add sugar to strawberry puree and put it over medium heat until it boils
3. Add 1 tbsp of strawberry puree at a time to corn flour and mix the flour in
4. Put the mixture back into saucepan and stir continuously until it thickens
5. Leave it aside to cool down
6. Whisk double cream until it thickens and sort of stiff 
7. Fold in strawberry into the thickened cream

Assembling the cake

1. Fill bottom sponge with half of strawberry mousse
2. Half strawberries and lay them on top of the mousse and cover them remaining mousse
3. Put the other half of cake on 
4. Make the ganache (in MANY of my previous posts, you will need about 250g dark chocolate for this one) and let it cool down slightly for 10 minutes and pour about 1/3 over the top to make a smooth finish. Let the remaining ganache to cool further for 30-40 minutes or until it is more of a paste in structure and COMPLETELY COOL! Spread that across the side of the cake to hide the filling and also act as the sticking agent for the chocolate structures on the side
5. Use a sharp knife to cut up the chocolate structure and stick them onto the chocolate ganache on the side of the cake, that is why it's important your ganache is cool, or it will melt the chocolate structures. Also, it's important to know, the ganache is FAR less sticky when it has completely cooled after a few hours, so if you stick the chocolate on now, they will stay on. But if you do them later, they won't stick
6. Now the cake can go into the fridge until next morning if you want
7. Melt some milk chocolate and pipe the message onto the cake and decorate with strawberries! YAY, FINISHED!

Orange souffle cheesecake

This is a VERY fluffy and soft cheesecake. So, it's quite different to the normal and heavier baked or unbaked cheesecakes that we are used to. And I think most people, including myself would have never ever associated a cheesecake with this kind of texture. However, unlike a traditional cheesecake, where you get a buttery biscuit base, the souffle cheesecake does not usually have a biscuit base at all (not that I'm aware of anyway). 

You can add all sorts of flavours to it as well just like a conventional cheesecake, but you need to be aware of the extra moisture you're putting in as that may affect the cake's final texture. The ingredients for this cake is for an 8 inch cake tin, so adjust your ingredients accordingly depending on the tin you have.

Ingredients

• 200g cream cheese
• 50g plain flour
• 15g corn flour
• 40g unsalted butter
• 5 eggs, separated 
• 120g caster sugar
• 80ml milk (full fat or semi-skimmed)
• 1 large orange
• 150g plain chocolate for decoration 

1. Heat cream cheese, butter and milk together until everything has melted
2. Sift the mixture to remove any lumps and let it cool to room temperature for 40-50 minutes
3. Pre-heat oven to 160 degrees C and line an 8 inch baking tin with parchment paper
4. Add all the egg yolks, zest from the whole orange and juice from half an orange to cheese mixture and whisk until smooth
5. Sift plain and corn flour into cake batter and whisk until combined
6. Measure caster sugar and set it aside 
7. Whisk egg white with electric whisk until foamy and add 1 tbsp of sugar to it at a time until all the sugar has been added and the egg white forms stiff peaks
8. Add a quarter of the egg white to cake mix and whisk together
9. Add the rest of the egg white to the cake mix and fold in the egg white gently, avoid bursting any air bubbles trapped inside the egg white
10. Bake for 75-90 minutes (Some would suggest a bain marie with this to avoid a cracked surface, but I didn't think that was a problem)
11. The cake is done when a knife comes out clean when poked inside 
12. Let is cool down very gradually inside the oven for 30 minutes. Then open the oven door slightly and let it cool down for another 2 hours before taking it out of the oven
13. Whilst cooking the cake, prepare chocolate decoration, melt chocolate over simmering water and pipe it randomly to form a fenced structure onto a baking parchment and let it cool down in the fridge for at least 3 hours 
14. Decorate cake with chocolate and orange slices when it has cooled down completely to room temperature 

chestnut loaf cake with caramelised nuts

Did you notice a massive chunk at the end of this cake is missing? Well, I cut a slice off and ate that before I remembered I forgot to take a photo for the blog. And the cake is not actually that yellow/golden, special effect of the sunlight from the window making it look sparkly! 

Ingredients

• 110g plain flour
• 110g caster sugar
• 140g unsalted butter
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 6 medium sized chestnuts
• 3 large eggs
• 3 tbsps milk 
• about 100-120g nuts, chopped into small pieces (I used walnut, cashew nut and pistachio)
• 100g white granulated sugar
• 30g butter
• 3 tbsp water

1. Pre-heat oven to 180 degrees C and line loaf tin with baking parchment
2. Sift and mix flour, caster sugar and baking powder together 
3. Cream the dry ingredients together with the butter, make sure the butter is at room temperature
4. Beat the eggs and milk together until silky, no need to over whisk this
5. Mix in a third of the egg into the cake mix and fold it in, then add in the rest and mix well
6. Chop cooked and peeled chestnuts into small pieces and mix them into the cake batter
7. Pour the mixture into loaf tin and bake for 30 minutes, the batter should start to become firm, but the inside is not cooked completely yet
8. When the cake has been baked for 20 minutes, start measuring white granulated sugar and put into a saucepan with 3 tbsp water and give it a good stir  with wooden spoon at low-medium heat
9. Take away spoon and let it boil without any stirring (N.B. very important, do not stir, or the sugar will crystallise and you will have to make it again)
10. Watch your caramel like a hawk, it can go from clear to amber quite quickly and once it is amber it can turn into a brown colour and become burnt within a minute
11. When the caramel is a golden/dark amber colour, but not brown, take it off the heat and add the butter to it
12. Let the butter melt without stirring
13. Once butter has melted, add in the chopped nuts and stir to coat nuts with caramel
14. Quickly lay the caramelised nut onto the cake and continue baking for another 15-20 minutes 
15. Take cake out of oven and test with a clean sharp knife, it should come out completely clean when it's done

Mint and fresh berries tartlets

This is a refreshing and not too heavy dessert that is great for mid afternoon tea. Or you can have it any time of the day, it really does fit in any time. The recipe to this is simple, most of which have been covered in previous blog posts. But there are slightly variations. 

Ingredients shortcrust pastry, makes about 6 tartlets)

• 175g plain flour
• 100g unsalted butter
• 30g icing sugar 
• 1 large egg yolk
• 1 tbsp cold water

1. Rub flour, sugar and butter together until it resembles breadcrumb structure
2. Add in egg yolk and water and knead until combined, you can overwork this, so watch out not to knead it for too long and too hard
3. Chill in the fridge for 30 minutes
4. Pre-heat oven to 200 degrees C 
5. Lightly flour bench top and rolling pin and roll out the pastry very thin (about 2-3mm)
6. Get a circular cutter and cut out the pastry and put it into the tartlet tins
7. Gently push the sides in with a piece of spare dough, if the pastry broke, don't worry, you can just stick some spare over and push it in gently to fill in the hole
8. Use a fork to prick a few holes at the bottom of the tartlets 
9. Put a piece of baking parchment over the pastry and put baking beans on top 
10. Blind bake for 15 minutes and then take out the baking beans
11. Bake again for 10 minutes
12. Take the tartlets out and cool in the tins 

Ingredients (creme patissiere)

• 4 large egg yolks
• 100g caster sugar
• 6 stalks of fresh mint leaves
• 260ml milk (semi-skimmed or full fat)
• 25g corn flour

1. Whisk egg yolks and caster sugar together until creamy
2. Add in corn flour and whisk until smooth
3. Chop mint stalks into approximately 2cm long pieces and heat them in the milk over medium-low heat, switch off heat when the milk boils
4. Leave it to cool down for 5 minutes
5. Sift milk into the egg/sugar/corn flour mixture and whisk while you put the milk in 
6. Pour the cream back into saucepan and put it on medium-low heat, continue whisking with wooden spoon/whisk whilst heating (this is important, or your eggs will get cooked and form lumpy bits)
7. When the creme patissiere boils, keep whisking until it thickens, this can take 1-2 minutes
8. Once the creme patissiere has thickened, take it off the heat and let it cool down to room temperature
9. Pipe the creme patissiere over the bottom of the tartlets until it is completely filled
10. Decorate the top with strawberries, raspberries and blueberries, either whole or sliced, decorate however you want

Puff pastry, Pear and cinnamon tarte tatin

This post will cover puff pastry AND tarte tatin together. The pastry I used is the full puff pastry, not rough puff. Don't know why, I just find this easier to work with. Every time I attempt rough puff I get butter everywhere and just gets very messy.

Ingredients (puff pastry)

1. 250g plain flour
2. 200g +  30g salted butter
3. cold water
4. 1 tsp lemon juice

• Rub in 30g butter into the flour until it resembles breadcrumb slightly at parts
• Add in the lemon juice and 1tbsp of water into the flour/butter mix 
• Use your hands to combine the ingredients and try not to overwork the dough
• Add another tbsp of water and mix again (if you added all the water at the same time, I find it harder to make the dough), after the 2nd tbsp, add 1tsp at a time until you get a smooth dough that is still a little bit wet, but not too wet as that is difficult to work with
• Wrap the dough in cling film and chill int the fridge for 30 minutes
• Weigh out 200g of butter and chill in the freezer for 10 minutes 
• Lightly flour the bench top and rolling pin and roll out your dough to about 20cm x 10cm
• Take the butter out of freezer and roll it out between 2 pieces of cling film or parchment paper to about 10cm x 8cm 
• Remove top layer of cling film/parchment parchment paper and put butter onto one side of the rolled out dough and take off the cling film on the other side. This will give your first dough-butter-dough layer 
• Use the other half of the dough to fold over the butter and roll it out to about 20cm x 10cm again 
• This time fold a third of the dough into the middle and then fold the other third on the other side over the top, i.e. a single fold (look this up if the instruction is not clear) 
• Wrap it in cling film and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes
• Repeat the rolling and single fold process again x 2 and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes 
• Finally repeat the single fold process again x 2 and here is your puff pastry! 

Ingredients (tarte tatin)

1. 3 conference pears (preferably not that ripe)
2. 2 tsps cinnamon
3. 75g demerara sugar
4. 75g unsalted butter

• Pre-heat oven to 200 degrees C
• In a saucepan, put sugar and unsalted butter on medium heat until both dissolved
• DO NOT STIR, this will promote crystal formation and you won't get a smooth caramel
• It's going to be extremely difficult judging the colour of caramel in this recipe, as the butter will make the caramel go yellow and demerara sugar is brown anyway, you will not be able to judge the amber colour of caramel
• Simply heat your caramel for 3 minutes after butter has melted and pour into an 18cm tin (not loose bottom or the caramel will leak out)
• Sprinkle 1tsp cinnamon evenly over the caramel 
• Peel and core 3 conference pears and quarter them
• Arrange them on the caramel however you want, but make sure you don't have large holes between the pears
• Sprinkle another tsp of cinnamon directly onto the pears 
• Put the tin into the oven and bake for 15 minutes to get the pear juice into the caramel and to heat off the excess moisture
• When the pears have 3 minutes left in the oven, take pastry out of the fridge and cut into a 22-24cm circle, i.e. slightly bigger than the tin
• Take tin out of oven and immediately put the pastry on top of the fruit and tuck the sides into the side of the tin
• Use a sharp knife and make a few small holes (3-4 is sufficient) in the pastry and put it back in the oven and bake for about 30 minutes or until the pastry is well risen and golden brown in colour
• Tip out excess fluid into a bowl , you can use this and reheat it and put it on top of the tarte tatin 
• Put a large plate on the tin and immediately and swiftly tip out the tarte tatin 
• Put the heated fluid on top and VOILA! Amazing tarte tatin!

Patisserie Leila, Bristol

How did I discover this place? Well, I've actually walked past it several times before on my way to friend's place. But I have NEVER been inside the patisserie. Yesterday, I was frustrated and essentially quite pi*ssed off in the morning at work so I decided to leave and work from home instead. At lunch time, since I had nothing in the house to make anything sweet with and I was in the process of proving my bread dough, I decided to go and buy myself some sweet treats! That's where Patisserie Leila come in. 

According to the patisserie's website, all the chefs/patissiers there were trained at Le Notre in France and the window display did look wonderful (and it's literally 5 minutes walk from my flat), it tempted me to go inside and buy something. As soon as I walked in, I was greeted with a smile and the waiter and waitress were very nice and welcoming. Me, being a typical difficult customer asked them if they can tell me what each of the display is and genuinely been quite thorough in what I asked. Again, they were very helpful! 

So moving on to the desserts. I bought 5 different flavours of macarons, a black forest gateau and a strawberry tart. The macarons were all delicious and looked ever so tempting. Both the texture and the flavour were great and You can definitely taste what is meant to be in each macaron. 

The black forest gateau, or what they insisted was a black forest gateau was also very good, the chocolate sponge was very moist and the flavour really complemented the fillings. Though the cream is just a little too sweet for me. Also, they have used strawberries instead of the traditional cherries to my surprise, hence I'm not sure if I can still call that a black forest gateau.

The strawberry tart also tasted very good. The creme patissiere was light and sweet, but a bit too runny for my liking, I would like it to hold its shape slightly better, but all in all, very good. 

So, I would really recommend this little cafe/patisserie to everyone who visits Bristol. It's fairly centrally located just off gloucester road and about 10 minutes walk from Bristol city centre. Another thing is, since it's not a chain, what it has to sell and on display varies from day to day, which I think is a good thing. 

So here is the address to this wonderful patisserie:

Patisserie Leila

88 Stokes Croft

Bristol, BS2 3RJ 

Cashew nut and walnut white loaf bread (version 2.0)

This is an improved version of my first bread, so don't judge me by how it looks (again). You won't win any competitions with the look of this, but it actually tastes quite ok and definitely beats normal bread you buy from stores. So, I'd recommend this to beginner bread makers, if I can do it, then you can too!

Ingredients

• 130g strong white flour
• 20g salted butter
• 4g fast action dried yeast
• Half tsp salt
• 130ml warm water (I actually measured it on my scale as I don't possess a measuring cylinder at the moment, but by the law of physics 1ml=1g surely)
• 15g walnut
• 15g cashew nut

1. Melt butter in microwave and leave it to cool to room temperature for 20 minutes 
2. Mix flour, salt and dried yeast together
3. Add butter and a third of the water and combine it with dry ingredients, then add another 1/3 and then the last bit. I find it hard to add all the water in one go, as it becomes too wet and the water doesn't get absorbed by the dry ingredients as well
4. Combine until it forms a wet and sticky dough
5. Then knead the dough on a lightly floured surface for 10 minutes. The dough should become smoother and should no longer stick to your hand very quickly into the kneading process, you will know when it's done by poking it with a finger and the dough should spring back slightly
6. Sprinkle some olive oil in a large container and put the dough inside and seal with cling film. Let it prove for 2 hours in a warm room and the dough should double in size. If your kitchen or room is cold, then you should leave it to prove for 4-5 hours 
7. Chop nuts roughly, they don't need to be very finely chopped as you would want the nutty texture
8. Flatten the dough and sprinkle the chopped nuts on it 
9. Work the nuts into the dough until it is distributed evenly within it and continue kneading for another 2 minutes
10. Put the dough back into olive oil sprinkled container and seal with cling film again and prove again. The size of the dough may not double, but it should increase in size. Let it prove for the second time for about 1 hour, or if your room is cold, let it prove for 2
11. Pre-heat oven to 220 degrees C when you can see the dough increasing in size and proved for at least 50 minutes 
12. Take the proved dough and put it on a baking tray with a piece of parchment paper and egg wash if desired and bake for 40-50 minutes 
13. When it's done, the bread should sound hollow inside when you tap the bottom. OR, if you have a meat thermometer, then follow this link and it will tell you something interesting: http://bakingbites.com/2008/02/how-do-you-know-when-bread-is-done-baking/ 

Long story short, the inside of your bread should be about 94 degrees C if it's cooked according to this website, not sure how true this is, but it's worth a try I guess if you have the equipment anyway. 

christmas decoration cake (attempt no.1 + 2)

attempt 1 

attempt 2

Christmas is fast approaching, ish, it's still more than a month away, but I suppose some of us do get ahead of ourselves sometimes. 

This is a visually nice looking cake, easy to make, but does take quite a lot of time making all the different components and assembling them. Most of the components used here have been covered by previous blog posts, so I'll simply put a link to the ones I've covered already. As each person has their own way of decorating things, I'll leave out the detailed decoration instructions and leave that to your imagination!

Macaroons: http://bakingscience.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/macaroons-for-those-who-are-struggling.html
Profiteroles: http://bakingscience.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/chocolate-cream-profiteroles-cream.html
Caramel: http://bakingscience.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/caramel-and-caramel-sauce.html

Ingredients 
victoria sponge

• 220g caster sugar
• 220g unsalted butter
• 220g self raising flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 4 large eggs

1. Line a 20cm x 40cm (or similar size) baking tray with baking parchment
2. Pre-heat oven to 180 degrees C 
3. Cream sugar, butter, baking powder and flour together
4. Add one egg at a time to the mixture and mix until combined and then add the next egg, etc until all the eggs have been added
5. Mix in vanilla extract
6. Put all the batter into the baking tray and bake for 30-35 minutes
7. The cake is done when you press the sponge gently and it springs back, and when poked with a knife, it comes out clean

Chocolate and cinnamon cookies

• 125g unsalted butter
• 75g icing sugar
• 130g plain flour
• 40g coco powder
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon 

1. Pre-heat oven to 160 degrees C
2. Mix butter and icing sugar together until the mixture is fluffy
3. Sift flour and coco powder into the mixture and knead into a smooth dough
4. Roll out the dough to about 3mm thick 
5. Cut out your rolled out dough into desired shapes (you will need to do the measurements beforehand)
6. Bake for 25-30 minutes 

Marzipan candy sticks
You don't actually need a recipe for this, it's quite straight forward really.

1. Get some marzipan, and some red sugar paste
2. Roll each of them out into a long strip
3. Twist them together and roll again and shape it into a candy stick!

Quick chicken and mushroom pie

This is my first savoury blog post! Please bear in mind that this is a quick version of the pie, where a lot of the components can be substituted with shop bought ingredients. Obviously nothing beats homemade everything, but for the sake of those who are busy with work, gets home after 6 or 7pm and just don't have the time to prepare everything from scratch. This is a very quick and easy thing to do! 

Ingredients

• 100 unsalted butter
• salt
• 250g plain flour
• 1 large egg
• 4 tbsps cold water
• 3 chicken breast fillets
• 7 large closed cup mushrooms
• Half an onion
• 1 tbsp Parsley
• Sprinkle of pepper
• Rolled puff pastry

1. Pre-heat fan oven to 200 degrees C
2. Mix butter, a pinch of salt and plain flour together until breadcrumb consistency
3. Add in theegg and mix
4. Add 1 tbsp of water at a time and knead the ingredients together, add just enough until the mixture is smooth and combined, you may not need 4 tbsps of water, or sometimes you may need 5 (this really varies)
5. Roll out the pastry to about 3mm thickness and place it inside the 20/22 cm baking tin or tart tray or anything that you can shape your pastry with 
6. Put a piece of parchment paper on the base of pastry and baking beans on top 
7. Place in oven and blind bake for 15 minutes (during this time, start preparing fillings by following steps 12-17)
8. Trim off the excess ridges and check whether the bottom of pastry is dry
9. When the pastry is dry, remove parchment paper and baking beans and return to oven for another 15 minutes 
10. Take pastry out of oven to cool down slightly
11. Lower oven temperature to 180 degrees C
12. Chop chicken into thin slices and sear on a hot frying pan
13. Cook quartered mushrooms and chopped onions (doesn't need to be chopped too small) over medium heat in the absence of oil and water, try to cook off excess water 
14. Mix mushroom, onion and chicken and add pepper, salt and parsley and briefly heat in frying pan
15. Heat up 150ml water with 2 vegetable cubes until the cubes have completely broken up 
16. Measure 20g corn flour and add 2 tbsp of vegetable stock to it
17. Repeat step 16 until the corn flour forms a thin paste
18. Add vegetable stock with corn flour to filling and mix and briefly heat for a minute 
19. Pour mixture into the base of the pie
20. Cut out puff pastry large enough to cover the base of the pie plus 1-1.5cm either side 
21. Place puff pastry over the top of the pie and seal it completely with the extra pastry on the sides and tuck around the base 
22. Poke 3-4 small wholes on the puff pastry lid to allow steam to escape 
23. Bake for 40-45 minutes, or until the puff pastry lid has risen and turned golden brown

Here is your hearty "homemade" chicken and mushroom pie. Majority of the work is done by you, but the most time consuming parts have been taken care of by your local supermarket! It's not completely completely homemade, but it's still A LOT better than the shop bought ones and it's probably healthier too!