Ready in under 40min, this creamy roast chicken pie is perfect when you need quick comfort food. The clever cheat’s topping uses leftover croissants instead of pastry, giving you a golden, buttery crust with minimal effort. It’s an ideal way to use up leftover roast chicken and stale croissants.
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Yields:
2
Prep Time:
10 mins
Cook Time:
25 mins
Total Time:
35 mins
Ingredients
1 Tbsp. butter
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 leek, trimmed and thinly sliced
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
3 Tbsp. plain flour
450 ml chicken stock
200 g leftover roast chicken, shredded
150 ml half-fat crème fraîche
1 tsp. Dijon mustard
3 Tbsp. fresh parsley, finely chopped
Zest and juice 1/2 lemon
2 croissants, torn into cubes
1/2 olive oil
50 g reduced-fat Cheddar, grated
Directions
Step 1Preheat the oven to 200°C (180°C fan) mark 6. In a large, lidded frying pan, melt the butter and fry the onion and leek over a medium heat for 2min. Add a splash of the stock, stir to combine and cover with a lid. Reduce the heat slightly and cook for 3–4min until the leeks have softened. Remove the lid, stir in the garlic and cook for 1min.
Step 2Add the flour and cook for 2min, stirring. Gradually pour in the chicken stock, stirring constantly, then simmer gently for 2min until slightly thickened. Stir in the chicken, crème fraîche, mustard, most of the parsley, lemon juice and zest. Season to taste, remove from the heat and set aside.
Step 3In a bowl, combine the croissant cubes with the olive oil, remaining parsley and half the cheese. Toss to coat. Spoon the chicken mixture into two 350ml pie dishes and scatter the croissant mixture over the top. Sprinkle over the remaining cheese and bake for 10-15min, until golden and crunchy.
GH TIP:
Swap the leftover roast chicken for cooked turkey after Christmas, or use a rotisserie chicken for an even quicker midweek dinner.
The GH Kitchen Team are Good Housekeeping’s resident recipe developers and all-round food obsessives. GH Kitchen Director Sarah Akhurst is our resident hosting pro and loves nothing more than putting on a foodie feast for friends. Our GH Kitchen Manager Linzi Pucino is our very own Italian food expert (originally hailing from the North East of Scotland!) and can be found working her way through midweek recipes that cover all bases, from haggis to ragu! Our Kitchen Editor Nadine Brown loves digging into the stories behind her favourite foods and enjoys applying her eclectic tastes to more modern, flavour-forward recipes - just don't give her too much chilli! Our Junior Food Content Produce Frankie Prichard combines a love of beautiful presentation and flavour-led, seasonal cooking in her recipe development, along with a passion for bringing people together through food. With a wealth of professional kitchen experience between them, they’re dedicated to ensuring every Good Housekeeping recipe is the best it can be, so you can trust they’ll work every single time
Linzi joins the Good Housekeeping team as Kitchen Manager, looking after the brand-new, state-of-the art test and demo kitchens based in the heart of Leicester Square. With over a decade of experience producing food content for leading brands, she’s won awards for her recipes, battled Christmas dinners in July, and spent a lot of time pondering the next big food trend (no more pistachio, please!) Originally from the North East of Scotland, she lives in West London with her Italian husband and twin daughters, feeding them a variety of haggis and ragu - depending on the mood!
