The Australian meat pie is a hand-sized meat pie containing largely minced meat and gravy – occasionally with onions and, more often than not, eaten as a take away meal. Australians love pies and Bob Carr went so far as to refer to eat as Australia’s “national dish” n 2003. Four’N'Twenty (a popular pie company) produces 50,000 pies per hour and Australians eat an average of 12 meat pies per person per year. According to statistics, the meat pie is one of the most popular types of food to be eaten whilst watching a game of Australian Rules Football! Here’s a recipe for a meat pie – so have some fun this weekend.

Ingredients

• 400 grams of minced, lean beef
• 1 medium onion, finely chopped
• 2 tbsp of olive oil
• 1 tbsp Maizena (corn flour)
• 180 ml fresh, homeade beef stock
• 1 generous tbsp tomato paste
• 1 tbsp Wocestershire sauce
• 1 tsp vegemite (for those who aren’t able to get hold of this, use Marmite or a half of a vegetable stock cube)
• 4 sheets frozen, ready-rolled pie pastry, thawed
• 1 large egg, beaten
• A silicon muffin tray or pie tins
• Ketchup to serve

Method

• Fry the onion over medium heat until soft and translucent – remove from the pan and set aside.
• Sir-fry the ground beef in the same pan, adding a little more oil if necessary, until browned and then stir in the onions again.
• Combine the Maizena with a tablespoon of the beef stock and stir well, then set aside.
• To the meat mixture, add the rest of the beef stock, the Wocestershire sauce, the tomato paste and the Vegemite, stirring well to combine everything – now add the Maizena and stir again.
• Bring to the boil, reduce the heat to low and simmer for 10 minutes until it is thick – remove from the heat and cool down.
• Preheat oven to 220 C.
• Place a pie tin on pastry and cut a circle around it – repeat the process to make as make the rest of the pie tops – depending on how many and what size you are making –set them aside.
• Now, put the pie tin on the pastry again and cut a circle that’s a little bigger than the tin (about  a cm larger) and that will be pie base – repeat the process to make the rest of the bases.
• Press the base pastry into pie tins (or muffin tins) and press up the sides.
• Fill with the meat mixture and brush the rims with water.
• Put the tops over meat and seal the edges with a fork or by crimping them – then brush with the egg.
• Put the pies onto a baking tray and bake for 20 minutes or until the are golden.
• Serve with ketchup.