Steak and chanterelle pasties with brown gravy and glazed carrots

I swear, I've almost worked through all of my chanterelles. I'm actually getting tired of eating them, being too much of a good thing. I've been craving pot pies and brown gravy and all that, and thought I'd give making pasties a go. It's pretty much just an empanada, so I used the dough recipe from last year's buffalo and chanterelle empanadas with mole.

I diced up some chuck steak, coated it in a little flour and browned it with some onion. This made a sticky (but savory-smelling) mess in the pan, so I removed the brown steak and added the chanterelles. Chanterelles, like all mushrooms, are almost all water and release copious liquid when cooking. This liquid deglazed the pan nicely and stirred up into thick gravy with the toasty brown fond-roux. I added some finely chopped thyme and rosemary, a squirt of Worcestershire and some salt and pepper, and stirred in one diced, boiled Yukon gold potato.

I spooned the filling into rounds of dough, sealed the edges with a little eggwash and then pinched the edges up into cute little pocket pies. I sloppily brushed the remaining eggwash on top of the pasties to brown and sent them to a 400 degree oven for about 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, I peeled and sliced some Sweet Nantes carrots and browned them in a little butter and sugar, then added a splash of chicken stock and simmered over a low flame until the carrots were tender and shiny. I added a pinch of kosher salt and fresh-crushed celery seed. The gravy was just beef stock (fortified with a bit of veal demi) shook up in a jar with some flour and simmered until the flour cooked and thickened.

The crust was nice and flaky, unlike the leaden pasties served up at the Horse Brass (who have the best fish and chips in Portland, but terrible pasties), and the silky gravy not at all like library paste. The filling was tender, moist umame. I'll definitely make this again.