Steak and Ale Pie

Put 4 tblspns of the flour in a bowl, with salt and pepper. Chop up the braising steak, season with the flour and add to the pressure cooker (pan) on a medium high heat with the olive oil, and the rest of the flour (2 tblspns which will thicken the sauce later). Fry off the steak until its really caramalised - it should almost look burnt (but not be burnt!). Once the steak has been sealed, and add the beer and de-glaze the pan.

In a seperate frying pan, sweat off the onions till they're soft, then add the garlic and fry for another couple of minutes. Add these to the pressure cooker.

Chop up the carrots (washed and peeled) into rough slices, then add to the cooker. Slice up the mushrooms, and add to the cooker.

Add the beef stock to the cooker, several good grinds of pepper, then turn up the heat and put the lid on, and bring up to a high pressure. Cook the beef for around an hour. Once the beef is cooked, check the seasoning and add extra salt if required, whisk in the butter, then ideally let it cool down a bit.

Take the dish you wish to make the pie with, and use this as a template to cut the pastry topping for your pie. Place the dish on the rolled out pastry, and cut and inch all the way round from the rim.

Laddle the contents of the cooker into the pie dish, and then place the puff pastry over the top, and seal the pastry round the edges (I'm sure you can make it look better than mine ;-) ). Add a small hole in the middle to allow the steam to escape.

Put the pie in a pre-heated oven at 180 degrees C for fan / 200 degrees C non-fan, and cook for around 20 minutes until the puff pasty has risen and is golden brown.