Fancy a Christmas pie? You’re in the right place.
Hand-crafted in the Highlands, we deliver them straight to your door, precooked and ready to reheat or pop in the freezer for a future pie night.
If you are looking for festive dinner inspiration, it begins right here with a pie. No sooner have your pumpkins been carved, smashed and reincarnated as autumnal soups and muffins, but our team of Pie Making Elves are ready to embrace the ‘most wonderful time of year’ with our annual Christmas Pie specials.
Christmas dinner is undoubtedly the best and most highly anticipated meal of the year, so it’s only natural that we focus on our favourite components and remix them into our fabulous festive pies.
We’re talking roasted meat and vegetables, gorgeous gravy and some festive finishing touches to bring some extra joy to every bite. These pies are the epitome of Christmas deliciousness, gift-wrapped in golden pastry.
Introducing our 2021 Christmas Specials
- The Christmas Pie full to the brim with roasted turkey, smoked pancetta and roasted parsnips in a rich sage gravy, topped with our bread sauce and cranberry.
- The Veggie Christmas Pie packed with roasted seasonal vegetables in a rich sage gravy topped with bread sauce and cranberry.
Our Lochinver Pie Makers (sorry, ‘Elves’) are a whizz at crafting impeccable pies, but it doesn’t end there: they have also created the ideal accompaniments from scratch. Serving our famous pies with substandard side dishes would be a culinary crime and a well-deserved mention on Santa’s naughty list!
We believe that some things are too good not to share, so we’re letting you in on our side dish secrets, from our top-notch gravy and creamy mash, to our Christmas cranberry sauce and spiced red cabbage. We’ve also sourced some more festive recipes to tempt you with. Let’s get cooking!
Classic 'Lochinver' Gravy
If you’ve visited us on the NC500 and tried our pies straight from the source, this is the gravy. There are a few ‘usual suspects’ in there, plus a few surprises which we believe take it to the next level. It’s been tried and tested on thousands of customers this year alone and we’ve now scaled it down so that you can recreate it at home.
Ingredients for approx. 1 litre
- 2 medium size onions (about 500g ) – sliced finely
- 20ml vegetable oil
- 550ml bottle Newcastle brown ale
- 1 litre stock (we use vegetable stock so suitable for all but could be substituted for a meat stock)
- 40g salted butter
- 50g plain flour
- 3 tbsp. treacle
- 4 tbsp. tomato ketchup
- Salt to taste (normally around ½ tsp)
Method
In a large pan heat your oil and add in your finely sliced onions. Cook on medium to high heat till really well cooked down, brown and soft, will take around 10-15 minutes too cook well.
When onions are nicely cooked, add into the hot pan the Newcastle brown ale. Cook this for a further 10-15 mins until mostly reduced down. Place this mixture in a bowl to the side for now.
Add butter to pan and melt. Add and stir in the plain flour and cook for 1-2 mins. Add in your stock and whisk well (in other words, make a roux). Add your onion and ale mix back into this along with your treacle and tomato ketchup. Stir well to combine all. At this stage you can chose to leave it as a nice, chunky onion gravy with the sliced onion whole or blitz it with a hand blender. We chose to do the latter and you end with a nice, smooth gravy. Season to taste.
Perfect Mashed Tatties
If you’re a true pie lover, you’ll already know how to rustle up some mash, but here are our wee secrets to achieve mash perfection. Simple and effective.
- Use warm milk and butter
- Pick a nice fluffy, floury potato (Maris Pipers are perfect)
- Invest in a good tattie masher
Top tip from our General Manager:
Add some chives and a bit of English mustard to liven it up!
Christmas Spiced Red Cabbage
You simply can’t beat a good old pie and potato combo, but it’s always good to break up this hearty duo with some festive veg, and this Christmas cabbage recipe is our favourite. Seasoned with festive cinnamon and cloves, sweetened by apples, port and dark brown sugar. Delicious.
Ingredients
- 1 red cabbage (about 1kg) finely sliced
- 15g butter and a tbsp. of vegetable oil
- 1 red onion - finely sliced
- 2 apples - grated
- 1 cinnamon stick
- 3-4 cloves (count them in so you remember to take them out or pop them in a wee muslin bag)
- 100ml of Port
- 2 tbsp of red wine vinegar
- 1 tbsp of dark brown sugar
Method
Heat butter and oil in a pan, then add cabbage and onions and cook for around 3-4 mins. Add in your grated apples, dark brown sugar, cinnamon and cloves, Port and red wine vinegar. Cook until reduced and the cabbage has softened, about 30-45 mins.
Cranberry Sauce
This most festive of condiments, a dollop of cranberry sauce is a Christmas essential and it’s even better when homemade. Our four ingredient creation requires minimum effort for maximum reward.
Ingredients
- 300g fresh or frozen cranberries
- 120g golden caster sugar
- 60ml port or red wine
- Zest of 1 orange
Method
Place all ingredients in a heavy based pot on a medium heat for around 10 minutes – or until berries start to burst. Take off the heat and stir through to break the berries up. Leave to cool.
More Festive Recipes to Try with your Pie
Creamy Cheese, Brussel Sprouts and Almond Gratin
Love them or hate them, we believe that when it comes to festive vegetables, Brussel sprouts are the elite of the elite and should be cooked with the respect that they deserve. We are drooling over this online recipe by The Happy Foodie, taken from the Great British Bake Off: Winter Kitchen cookbook. Brussel sprouts baked with creamy, cheesy, potato goodness and ground almonds. We would most definitely sprinkle some toasted almonds on top too.
Christmas Spiced Custard
In addition to our Christmas Pie and Veggie Christmas Pie, we also have our standard selection of sweet pies for all your seasonal dessert needs. Now, we’re not suggesting you should eat a pie for your main course and dessert in one sitting but we wouldn’t stop you either. Give our sweet pies a festive makeover with the additional of this Christmas Spiced Custard recipe by The Spruce Eats. Silky, vanilla custard spiced with cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg. Yuuuum! We think this would pair wonderfully with our classic Apple Pie and Chocolate, Pear and Almond Pie.
We hope you’re hungry for your festive pie fix! Order yours now via our Pies by Post service.
