Open Face Curried Lamb Pie

Directions

1. In a sauce pan, bring milk to a boil with salt. Remove from heat, and add 1 cup of flour right away, whisk immediately to prevent lumps forming. Continue stirring with a wooden spoon or spatula until smooth. Let cool until manageable by hand.
2. Meanwhile, whisk eggs and oil together. Once the cooked dough is easily handled without burning your fingers, work in the egg mixture until uniform. The dough will be quite runny at this point.
3. Add the rest of the flour in small batches, until bread-like dough forms. The dough may still be a bit sticky, but it will be smooth and elastic. It’s possible that you may need a bit less or a bit more flour than specified. Let the dough rest, covered with a towel, for at least 30 minutes.
4. Prepare the filling: mince the meat, onions and garlic in a processor. In a large bowl combine all ingredients and mix thoroughly until uniform in texture and sort of feathery and fluffy. It should feel like thick whipped cream when stirred. If it’s too stiff, add a bit more yoghurt. Take care not to make it too runny.
5. Heat the oven to 450°F. Divide the dough in half. Roll each piece of dough on a well floured surface into a 15? round. Transfer the round of dough onto a baking sheet (no greasing is necessary). Put half of the filling in the middle of the dough and spread evenly to form about 9-10? inch circle. Fold the dough over the filling all the way around without covering the filling completely, lightly pinch-pleating it as shown on the photo.
6. Bake the pies at 450°F for about 15 minutes, or until the pie is nicely golden on top. Reduce the heat to 400°F and bake for another 30 minutes or so, until juice in the filling is almost completely reduced and the pie is nicely browned. You may need to swap the pies from lower to upper rack a few times to ensure even browning.
7. Remove from the oven while some of the liquid is still in the filling. It will set in a few minutes. At this point, you can garnish the pies with fresh basil or mint leaves. Cover the hot pies with foil for a few minutes to keep the dough from becoming stiff. Cut like a pizza pie, into 6 slices and serve.