Lazy Steak & Pickled Onion Pie

I met a friend for lunch at surely London's best pub, The Anchor & Hope, on Friday. It all went a bit wrong as she was an hour late and I drank the two glasses of Prosecco I'd allowed myself in the first half an hour. And I was really hungry which didn't help. Anyway, we ended up drinking way too much including some excellent dessert wine with our excellent Damson Bakewell Tart. But best of all was the steak pie for two which had cooked-for-hours, fall-apart-meat with a few little pieces of kidney, a dark gravy and a proper 'pork-pie-style' hot-water crust. My current favourite blog Old Foodie says it's pie week this week and so here's my favourite cheat's recipe - it can't compare to the A&H pie but it's quick and easy and uses jars and packets so I am sure Delia would approve.

Serves 4
1 tbsp olive oil
4 rashers smoked streaky bacon
750g cubed casserole or braising steak
4 tbsp plain flour
75cl bottle red wine
1x 450g jar silverskin pickled onions drained and rinsed (250g drained
weight)
3 tbsp redcurrant jelly
2 fresh thyme sprigs
375g pack ready-rolled puff pastry
salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 Heat the oil in a large casserole pan cut the bacon into 1 cm wide strips, and add to the pan.

2 Season the flour with salt and pepper then toss the steak in the mixture. Shake off any excess flour then add to the pan and cook for 7-8 minutes, turning from time to time until nicely browned.

3 Add the wine, pickled onions, recurrent jelly and thyme. Bring to the boil, partially cover and simmer for 1 hour.

4 Preheat the oven to 200c / gas 6. Open out the pastry and cut to about
2cm larger than the pan, rolling out slightly thinner if necessary. Place on top of the steak, tucking in the edges to enclose the filling. Brush with milk then bake for 20 minutes until golden and puffed.