Flakey Cornish Pasties filled with creamy celery root, potatoes, leeks and pickled apples.
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A few years ago, my husband and I bumped along the roads of Ireland with another couple. For one beautiful week, we toured castles, rambled rocky coasts, and relaxed over hardy, comforting food. One of my favorite meals while we were there was Cornish pasties, which actually hail from Cornwall.
For the uninitiated, traditional Cornish pasties are half-moon shaped flakey pastries stuffed with tender chunks of beef, potatoes, and onions -- perfect fare for cold drizzly days of Ireland or Cornwall. When I migrated to a more vegetarian diet, I wanted to create a vegetarian version. Our favorite version features slightly mashed celery root, potatoes and Leek Confit, with a sprinkling of pickled apples and shallot for a little acid bite.
I like to serve these on St. Patrick's Day with colcannon (Irish mashed potatoes) and a vegetarian Irish stew. It's the perfect Irish dinner.
Feel free to make your own pastry, but I took a slightly easier path with store-bought frozen puff pastry since our kitchen was in the midst of being packed up for the kitchen remodel that started yesterday. If you're throwing a St. Patrick's Day party this year, or just staying home to enjoy a pint of your favorite beer, these make the perfect appetizer. Or add a salad for a great lunch or dinner.
Cook's Notes
At first glance, these Cornish pasties may appear to be complicated and involve a lot of ingredients. Most of the time is spent prepping the ingredients for the filling, it's true. But the Leek Confit can be made ahead and kept in the refrigerator for up to two weeks, and the Pickled Apples and Shallots can be made at least one week in advance. If you want to make the entire filling in advance, no worries. It will keep in the refrigerator for several days. Then just roll out the dough, fill the pasties and bake them off for a party or quick weeknight dinner. If you want to form and fill the pasties in advance, I recommend freezing them until you're ready to bake them off to prevent the dough from becoming soggy.
The Wimpy Vegetarian Table
The easiest meat to add to these little pastry packets is pork sausage. Just slice up and sauté in a little olive oil, and chop fairly finely. Divide the celery root filling between the vegetarian and omnivore and add the sausage to the omnivore's portion. Fill the pastries and bake.
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Vegetarian Cornish Pasties
Ingredients
Quick Pickled Apples and Shallots
- 1 ½ cups finely diced apple about 1 large apple, Fuji and Honeycrisp are both good choices
- ½ cup minced shallots, about 1 large
- ¼ lemon, juiced
- ¾ cup apple cider vinegar
- 8 teaspoons sugar
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- ¼ teaspoon coarse black pepper
Cornish Pasties Filling
- 1 tablespoon unsalted butter
- 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 1 cup finely diced celery root
- 1 cup finely diced russet potato
- ¼ cup finely diced celery
- ½ cup vegetable broth or water
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- ¼ teaspoon coarse pepper
- 2 tablespoons Leek Confit (optional)
- ½ teaspoon Dijon country mustard
- 2 tablespoons crème fraîche
- 2 tablespoons coarsely grated Gruyere cheese
- ¼ cup Quick Pickled Apples and Shallots recipe below
- Frozen puff pastry or short pastry pie dough
Instructions
- Make the Leek Confit if you plan to use it in the filling. It can be made up to 2 weeks ahead and kept in the refrigerator in a sealed container.
Pickled Apples and Shallots
- Place the diced apple and shallot in a medium bowl and squeeze a little lemon over the top. Combine the remaining Pickled Apples and Shallots ingredients in a small saucepan over medium heat.
- Bring to a simmer. Once the sugar and salt are dissolved into the liquid, pour over the apples and shallots, and soak for 30 minutes.
Cornish Pasties Filling:
- Melt the butter and oil together in a skillet over medium-high heat. Add the celery root, potatoes, and celery, and sauté for 10 minutes. Stir in the broth, salt and pepper. Cover the skillet and simmer for 15 minutes. All of the liquid should be absorbed.
- Lightly mash and stir in 2 tablespoons of Leek Confit (if using), reserving the remaining confit for another use. Add the mustard, crème fraîche, Gruyere cheese, and ¼ cup Pickled Apples and Shallots. Allow to cool.
Make the Pasties
- Preheat the oven to 400˚F. Roll out thawed pastry and cut into 5” circles using a sharp knife. I have a small mixing bowl I use that’s the perfect size to trace around.
- Place 1 rounded tablespoon of Cornish Pasties Filling on one half of the circle, leaving a ½” border. Gently fold the other half of the pastry over the filling. Seal using the tines of a fork. Brush with butter and add a dusting of salt and pepper.
- Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, and bake for 25 minutes.
- Serve warm.
cheri
Hi Susan, these look absolutely gorgeous, there is a restaurant in a neighboring city that is all about the pasties, and oh how we enjoyed ourselves. I have not yet cooked with celery root but this looks like a great way to be introduced. Happy Wednesday!
The Wimpy Vegetarian
Thanks so much cheri! I cook quite a bit with celery root now, but for the longest time I just wasn't quite sure what to do with it. At Thanksgiving I mixed roasted celery root with potatoes for mashed potatoes, and sometimes I just use them as a side vegetable straight from roasting. My next project to experiment with slabs of celery root as a 'steak'. But I need to wait for the kitchen remodel to be done before I can really dig in 🙂
Erika
Unless my memory is failing me, I think these were mentioned in Harry Potter and I am prettty sure I remember wondering what they were. Now I know! And they look SO delicious! Your version kind of reminds me of chicken pot pie empanadas with the celery and the potato and everything...but with cheese and puff pastry!!! Which makes it incredibly more yum 🙂 Fabulous guest post!!
The Wimpy Vegetarian
Thanks so much Erika! I think of empanadas as being Cornish pasties essentially the same. They are so, so good 🙂
apuginthekitchen
I so envy your trip to ireland, it's the one place I absolutely have to visit, it's at the top of my bucket list. Your pasties look so good, flaky and tender and a really delicious filling. Great guest post on Yummly!
The Wimpy Vegetarian
Thanks Suzanne. And in the interest of full disclosure, we loved Ireland, but Myles had hurt his back before we left home and after bumping along the roads in Ireland, we had to make an emergency flight back home after 5 or 6 days for emergency back surgery. We had planned originally to stay for an additional week for a walking tour of the Ring of Kerry. So that's still on my bucket list 🙂
Choc Chip Uru
The Irish would go crazy over these festive pasties, I saw them in every bakery in London even 😀
Cheers
Choc Chip Uru
Marie
These look delicious!
Jean | DelightfulRepast.com
Susan, I adore pasties of all kinds and eat lots of vegetarian meals even though I'm not vegetarian at this time. Flexitarian. These pasties sound delightfully delicious! I cannot imagine food blogging during a kitchen remodel! Fortunately, I remodeled three years before I started my blog.
The Wimpy Vegetarian
Thanks so much Jean! So fun hearing a little about your remodel thru twitter LOL. I'm not very regular right now on the blog unfortunately. Mostly because my days are filled with decisions, ordering tile, cabinet hardware, etc. Ai-yi-yi. But we love our contractor - he's doing a fabulous job with the remodel and navigating hubby's and my little 'debates' over material selections and installation. New floor should be finished up today hopefully, and we're thrilled with it. Some of the new cabinets go in on Monday - so excited to see everything happen, piece by piece. Hats off to you for being the contractor on your kitchen remodel. I'm in awe of you!!!
Terra
Growing up in Michigan, we took trips to Mackinac Island and on the way stopped for pasties. They are a different variation to Irish pasties, but all for sure amazing! I love how flaky your crust is, your pasties look so delicious! Hugs, Terra
laurasmess
These sound absolutely delicious. Celeriac, apples, leek confit... heavenly! I will definitely try these Susan. Fab recipe for Yummly, definitely a worthy opponent to the traditional meat-filled Cornish pasties (which I love, by the way... but these sound just as satisfying!) x
Paul:-)
Hi Susan,
These Pasties sound delicious but I’m not sure if you would legally be able to call them Cornish. A Cornish pasty has a legally protected definition. Your recipe has only one ingredient (potato) that would be found in a Cornish Pasty. Also the crimping of the crust is wrong. A Cornish Pasty is with a pronounced crimped ridge across the top, as a spine. The reason for this was that they were taken into the tin and lead mines in lunchboxes. No hand washing facilities so the raised crust was used to hold the pasty whilst the rest of it was eaten. The crusts were thrown to the ‘Knockers’ (google it). It was also quite common to have savoury at one end of the Pasty and a sweet concoction in the other half.
Hope that gives an insight,
Paul:-)