Autumn Harvest Pot Pie
The perfect way to celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving
When I went vegan one of the hardest times was dealing with the holidays. I loved my mother’s turkey dinner but more than that I loved having a special meal just for the occasion. Over the years I have tried every variety of vegan turkey, roast, roll, and pastry encased loaf out there at both a great cost and often a real disappointment. Everything was just fine, but none of it felt really special. What I was missing was tradition.
For Christmas I’ve started making vegan lasagna every year and I’ve been looking for a similar signature dish for Thanksgiving. Until it hit me… pot pie. But not just any pot pie, one that celebrates all the amazing abundance from our local farms at this time of year.
This recipe is really a celebration of what is at the heart of Canadian Thanksgiving, being thankful for the harvest. It features carrots, celery, onions, garlic, and mushrooms all from my local farm and herbs from my backyard. The only vegetable I picked up at the grocery store was a yam. Most of this should be in season across Canada right now and at their peak freshness. If you make it and swap out the yam for a different seasonal veggie where you are (like squash) let me know how it turns out!
My hope is that this dish could be something special for you the way it is for me. I did get a non-vegan to try it as well and he loved it, so I think it’s also a really accessible dish for those who aren’t vegan but might be willing to try something that doesn’t have “meat alternatives”. It’s easy to get your head around veggies, especially when you call it something fun like Harvest Pot Pie.
Serves: 6-8 people
Ingredients:
1 small red onion, diced
1 small yellow onion, diced
2 stalks of celery with leaves, diced
2 medium carrots, diced
600 g yam, diced
300 g oyster mushrooms, shredded
2 large cloves garlic, finely diced
4 sprigs fresh thyme, leaves stripped
Fresh ground pepper
Kosher salt
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
2 cups beefless broth
1 sheet Dufour Pastry Kitchen Vegan, Dairy-Free Pastry Dough
Substitutions: If you can’t find the vegan puff pastry you can use a can of Pillsbury Jumbo Crescents which should be vegan.
A few notes on this recipe. You’ll notice that some of the ingredients are done by weight and others by quantity. In general I think most people can tell what a small, medium, and large carrot or onion looks like. But when dealing with something like yams putting a quantity like “large” can be extremely subjective. I’ve seen ones the size of my fist and others the size of my head depending on the harvest. Similar with mushrooms, they can vary so much by size so I figured a weight measurement would be more useful.
If you haven’t used oyster mushrooms before I encourage you to try them here. They have a very specific texture and are a little chewier and stringy. It’s a great replacement if you’re looking for something “meaty” but I know some people have texture issues. Another alternative would be to use portobello mushrooms, diced.
The Dufour Pastry has to be thawed in the fridge for a few hours before you can use it. I ended up doing it overnight and it turned out fine.
Now that’s out of the way… get out your widest and deepest frying pan, I used a 13 inch heavy bottomed one. Preheat the pan on medium heat with 2 tablespoons of olive oil until it gets ripply. Add in your mirepoix: diced onions, celery, and carrots with freshly cracked black pepper and about a teaspoon of kosher salt. Cook for about 5 minutes until you can just start to really smell the celery and the onions are glossy.
Add in the diced yams, garlic, thyme and cook for 10 minutes. The yams won’t be soft yet, but they will have a little give to them.
Add in the shredded oyster mushrooms, and 1 tablespoon of Wizard’s Worcestershire sauce, stir everything together to combine. Cook for another 10 minutes.
Add in 1/2 cup of whole wheat pastry flour and mix until fully incorporated into the veggies and no dry bits are left. From here start adding the beefless broth half a cup at a time. You want to make sure it’s fully incorporated and starts to cook with the flour.
Bring the mixture to a boil and continue to stir until it looks like the veggies are in a thick gravy rather than a soup. If it starts to stick to the bottom of the pan it’s definitely ready. Pour into a 9 x 13 casserole dish.
Preheat the oven to 375F.
Sprinkle some flour on your counter and using a rolling pin roll out your Dufour Pastry dough until it is the size of your casserole dish. Transfer it over to cover the vegetable filling and tuck in the edges. Cut a few slits on the top to let it vent.
Bake for 50-60 minutes or until the top is brown and the edges are bubbly.
Let sit for at least 10 minutes before trying to cut into it.
