Allow me to clarify: it is me who is lazy, and not the chicken pot pie. Usually I'm so lazy when it comes to making chicken pot pies that I just buy the ones in the frozen section of the grocery store. Well, not this time! After discovering just last week who Nigella Lawson is and that she is a proponent of using real butter, I had been dying to try making her chicken pot pie. On the show where she made the pie, she happily declared that it took only half an hour to make ("We'll see about that!" I thought). What with having to go to the grocery store twice after forgetting to buy chicken bouillon the first time, it definitely took me longer than half an hour to make this pie. However, that is unimportant, because it was sooo worth it. I don't know if I'll ever be able to buy one of those frozen pot pies again, because they are just so lame by comparison.

   After riding a crowded bus home from a grueling discussion section for my Philosophy class (I did mention I was lazy, right?) I just wanted something delicious for dinner that wasn't going to take a lot of finesse to make. This pie is exactly that.

Ingredients:
1 sheet frozen puff pastry, thawed (you won't need the whole sheet, so plan on using the rest to make a dessert, the recipe for which I will post tomorrow)
1 strip of bacon, cut into pieces about 1/2 inch wide.
1/2 lb chicken breast tenders, cut into approximately 1 inch pieces
1/2 carrot, diced
1 stalk of celery, diced
3 crimini mushrooms, cut into fourths
1/4 cup frozen peas (I forgot to put these in, and it was good anyway)
1 cube chicken bouillon
2 cups water
2 tbsp flour
2 tbsp butter
1 tsp thyme

First, take the puff pastry out of the freezer to thaw and preheat the oven to 300 degrees F. Cook the bacon in a skillet over medium heat until the bacon has released enough grease to cover the bottom of the pan. Add the carrots, celery, and mushrooms and sautee for a couple minutes, until the mushrooms begin to brown. Seal the chicken pieces in a ziplock bag with the flour and the thyme and shake to coat the chicken. Put water in a kettle and bring it to a boil. Pour the chicken, flour, and thyme into the skillet with the bacon and vegetables, and cook for a minute or two, until the chicken is slightly browned. Add the butter and stir vigorously with the flour in the bottom of the skillet to make a paste (This is called a roux). Now add the water that you just boiled, and stir the roux into it to make a gravy-like sauce. Cook the pot pie filling in the skillet for about 5 more minutes while you roll out the puff pastry to about 1/8 inch thick. Spoon the pie filling into 2 small ramekins, filling them almost to the top.

Cut two thin strips of puff pastry, moisten them with wet fingers, and wrap them around the edge of each ramekin. Now cut two squares of puff pastry large enough to cover the ramekins, and place them on top of each pie. Use a fork to press down the edges and poke several holes in the middle to let steam escape. Place the pies on a cookie sheet, and bake them for about 20 minutes, until the puff pastry is golden.