Food and Travel & Food and Travel
A tall golden suet pastry beef and ale pie cut open to show short rib, mushrooms, carrots, and dark gravy
main British

Michelin beef and ale pie

Short rib and beef cheek braised in stout, wine, and stock fill a deep suet-pastry pie with caramelised onions, mushrooms, carrots, and glossy gravy.

Prep150 min
Cook480 min
Rest180 min
Oven140°C
Servings10
Cook mode

Adapted for the home kitchen from Fallow's Michelin beef and ale pie

Ingredients

Written for a 25 cm round tin

Units
Servings
10

Braised beef

  • 1 2/3 kg bone-in beef short ribs
  • 1 1/8 kg beef cheeks
  • 100 g plain flour, for dusting
  • 45 ml neutral oil
  • 2 onions, roughly chopped
  • 3 carrots, roughly chopped
  • 2 celery ribs, roughly chopped
  • 4 garlic cloves
  • 30 g tomato purée
  • 375 ml dry red wine
  • 1 1/8 L stout, two imperial pints
  • 75 ml Worcestershire sauce
  • 1 5/8 L beef stock, enough to submerge
  • 10 g fresh thyme and rosemary
  • 50 g reserved beef fat
  • 50 g plain flour for beurre manié

Filling garnish

  • 3 large onions, thinly sliced
  • 4 carrots, quartered
  • 250 g button mushrooms, halved
  • 60 g butter

Suet pastry

  • 500 g plain flour
  • 100 g cold unsalted butter, diced
  • 100 g beef dripping or shredded suet
  • 225 ml ice-cold water, add only as needed
  • 6 g fine salt
  • 1 egg, beaten for egg wash

Method

  1. Season and flour the beef. Brown in oil in batches. Brown the chopped onions, carrots, celery, garlic, and tomato purée.
  2. Deglaze with wine and stout and reduce by half. Return beef and vegetables; add Worcestershire, herbs, and enough stock to submerge. Cover with a cartouche and lid and braise at 140°C for 6 hours.
  3. Cool the beef in liquid 1 hour. Lift out meat, strain liquid, and reserve 50 g surface fat. Mix fat with 50 g flour and whisk it gradually into simmering liquid until glossy. Season.
  4. Slowly caramelise the sliced onions in half the butter until deep brown. Brown mushrooms and carrots in the rest with thyme, keeping them firm.
  5. Rub flour, salt, butter, and suet to a coarse sandy texture. Add cold water only until the dough joins. Wrap and chill at least 3 hours.
  6. Butter a deep 25 cm tin. Roll two-thirds of pastry 5 mm thick, line the tin, and chill 30 minutes. Roll the lid and chill.
  7. Break beef into large chunks, discarding loose bones. Layer onions, beef, vegetables, and enough cold gravy to coat, filling the tin no more than four-fifths full.
  8. Egg-wash the rim, add the lid, seal, trim, crimp, and cut steam vents. Chill 30 minutes.
  9. Bake at 160°C for 90 minutes until the pastry is deeply golden and the centre reaches 74°C. Rest 20 minutes.

Notes

  • This is an intentionally large celebration pie. Leftover braised beef and gravy freeze well if the tin holds less than the full batch.
  • The filling must be cold before assembly or the pastry fat melts and the base turns heavy.
  • For an alcohol-free pie, replace stout and wine with stock plus 30 g malt extract and finish the gravy with cider vinegar.

Sources used

Good with

Sources consulted

From Christoph Mayer

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