This was one of those recipes I was really not sure about.  It sounded interesting but adding a sauce towards the end and not at the start?!  How the hell does that make the dish flavorful let alone get to all parts of the pie?  So here I did a little experimenting.  It was a fun learning experiment and the pies were adored when served at a gathering of friends.

To Bake Chickins:

Translation:

Season them with cloves, mace sinamon ginger, and some pepper, so put them into your coffin, and put thereto corance dates prunes, and sweet butter, or els maro,and when they be half baked, put in some sirup of vergious, and some sugar, shake them togither and set them into the oven again…. (A Book of Cookrye: Very Necessary for all such as delight therin. 1591)

Ingredients:

1.5 lbs. cut up chicken

1 Tsp ea. of ground cloves, mace, cinnamon, ginger and pepper

1 C. chopped currents, dates and prunes

1⁄2 C. cubed butter                                                                                 

1⁄2 C. Balsamic vinegar

1 Tbs. sugar

Crust:  Hot water crust

Redaction:

I took chicken thighs and cut into bite sized pieces.  Mixed them with all the spices and fruit.  If you don’t have currants added chopped up raisins.

Corances are currents for those wondering about this bit of English spelling

Here I used a butter crust. It won’t stand up on its own but has an amazing mouth feel/taste.

I put the crust into small molds normally used for cheese cakes with quick release at the sides.  The crust should be able to stand up on its own; however I wanted flavor not just a stiff upper crust.  Hence the hot water crust and mini tart pans. 

The tops have a circle at each center. This is to pour 2 Tbs. of the vinegar and sugar mixture when the pies are half cooked.  I used a knife to cut out the circle.  I would have preferred to use a small round punch of some sort instead.  These look a bit messy but get the job done.

Bake these for about 25 minutes before pulling the pies out to pour in the vinegar mixture.  I know you’re asking yourself how the hell do I get this in there?!  During the cooking the filling will shrink leaving a space between crust and interior.  

The process was a little messy as I used a spoon and not a spouted pouring device. This didn’t effect the flavor though the crusts were a bit discolored instead of being a toasty golden brown, more of a mottled colored where the vinegar spilled.

Return the pies for another 20 minutes, then pull out for serving.   

Personally, I wouldn’t do much larger even if I weren’t using the small molds.  These are very filling on their own.  A small one will fill most people up easily.  If you’re doing a feast then I can understand doing a pie sized, but cook one first to make sure the vinegar mixture actually mixes into all sections and not just partially.  This was the perfect size for the small amount of mixture per pie used.