CURRY PIES

I picked this up from Diane, who grew up in the vicinity of the Java Sea. She has lots of good stories, and shared some good food ideas. I have changed it little - mostly just quantifying the ingredients. Tasty and addictive, they are darned good when fresh from the oven, and pretty tasty even from the fridge. The filling even freezes and keeps well. The quantities below are what I used for this batch, but the recipe scales very well, so you can make as much as you like. You'll never want to make just a little...

INGREDIENTS
2 1/2 lbs* bottom round steak, diced into 1/4" pieces
white onions, diced into 1/4" pieces, equal volume to amount of meat
potatoes, diced into 1/4" pieces, equal volume to amount of meat
canned biscuits (not the flaky type)

*(you can scale this recipe to about any amount - makes about 20 per pound of meat)

For each pound of meat, you will need:
1/2 tsp butter
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1 tsp oil
1 tsp Malaysian hot curry powder, vary amount to taste

salt & pepper


METHOD
Clean your meat well of all fat, gristle and connective tissue.
Dice it into even cubes, about 1/4" in size. Form this into a pile on a clean plate or cutting board.
Next, cut potatoes to the same size, 1/4" dice. Keep doing this until you have a pile equal in size to the meat. Repeat for the onions. You want to end end up with three equal-sized piles - meat, potatoes and onions.
Add oil to large frying pan over medium heat, then when at temperature, add meat and brown. Reduce heat and cook until tender. When done, remove meat and set aside.
Next, add butter, onions and potatoes to frying pan, stirring occasionally until onions are translucent and potatoes start to soften. Below is a bad pic of the curry powder I use. There are many kinds available, but the Malaysian has a unique balance of heat, sweet and flavor that work in this dish. The others don't seem to have the same effect.
Add the meat back to the frying pan, add the curry powder, and stir to incorporate. Turn heat down and stir occasionally, letting the flavors meld.
Remove curry filling from pan, set aside, and let cool. Then refrigerate until ready to assemble the puffs.



MAKING THE PIES
You can make the dough yourself, and roll it out to make these. I know how good they are, and don't want to wait that long to eat some. After all, the dough is only the delivery vehicle for the main event. I find that cheap 'whomp' biscuits work out well for this, and are always the perfect size. Just don't use the flaky kind.
Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Open up a can of biscuits and separate them out. The following works best if you keep them cold. Pull, stretch and flatten the biscuits out to about a 5" diameter. Try and do this without creating holes, as they can be difficult to close back up successfully.
Drop a heaping tablespoon of cold filling in the center of the biscuit, taking great care to keep it away from the outer inch of the biscuit round.
Carefully fold the biscuit in half, pinching the edges together. Try and get the air out of inside as you do this.
Repeat the above until you have enough to space out on a greased baking sheet. Actually, I use a Silpat, so there's no oil and no sticking. Place the pan in the oven and bake them until they start to turn a golden brown on top. You know what biscuits are supposed to look like - they should look like that. I started peeking at these after about 15 minutes.
Pull them out, move them to a rack to cool and repeat the process until you have made as many curry puffs as you like. Freeze the remaining filling -it keeps well for a long time. Finally, the reward!