Aussie beef meat pies mastered at home

By Jaci Hicken

Jun 25, 2025

The pie filling is made by slow cooking chuck steak with vegetables, cornflour, paprika, tomato paste, Vegemite, and beef stock for 6 hours. Photo by Jaci Hicken

Jaci Hicken, a seasoned Riv journalist and trained chef, shares her wealth of knowledge on growing, cooking, and preserving homegrown produce and insights from running her cooking school. In this edition, Jaci has combined rough puff pastry and lard pastry to cook our Aussie favourite: meat pies.

We made rough puff pastry when we cooked sausage rolls, then we made lard pastry to cook Cornish pasties.

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This week, we are going to combine rough puff pastry and lard pastry to make the Aussie favourite, beef meat pies.

You know, the ones you grab at the footy and smother with a bit of dead horse (tomato sauce).

First, we need to make the filling in a slow cooker, or it could be done in a casserole dish in the oven.

You would have done this yesterday, allowing it to cool in the fridge overnight to be easier to handle.

Beef meat pie filling

Ingredients

1 tbsp olive oil
1 cup onion, finely diced
1 cup carrots, finely diced
1 cup celery, finely diced
½ cup corn flour
1kg chuck steak, diced
1 tbsp smoked sweet paprika
140g tomato paste
1 tbsp Vegemite
500ml beef stock
A good pinch of pepper and salt to taste

Method

Turn your slow cooker to high and add the olive oil. Add the onion, carrot and celery.
Place the chuck steak in a bowl and toss with the cornflour. Stir to cover the chuck steak with the cornflour.
Lift the steak out of the cornflour, shaking off any excess and place it in the slow cooker on top of the vegetables. Keep the cornflour aside until the end.
Add the paprika, tomato paste, Vegemite, and pepper, then pour over the beef stock — taste to see if you need more salt.
Place the lid on the slow cooker and cook for 6 hours, or until the meat is tender and falls apart.
If the sauce is not thick enough, add a little water to the remaining cornflour to make a slurry. Stir through the meat.
Allow to cool completely before filling the pie cases.

Now, to assemble your meat pies.

I like to use muffin tins to make meat pies in, giving me party pie pies.

If you want to do this, it is a good idea to cut out circles of baking paper that fit in the bottom of the muffin tin to stop the pies sticking.

Beef meat pie recipe

Ingredients

1 batch lard pastry
1 batch rough puff pastry
1 batch beef meat pie filling — chilled
1 egg
½ cup of milk
Butter

Method

On a well-floured surface, roll out the lard pastry and rough puff pastry to a thickness of 2mm.
Whisk together the egg and milk in a small bowl to make an egg wash.
Grease your pie tins well with butter and line with baking paper circles.
Cut out rounds of lard pastry to fit your pie tins and line your pie tins with the lard pastry.
Place an amount of beef meat pie filling in each pie. Make sure not to overfill.
Cut out rounds in your rough puff pastry to fit on the top of your pies.
Dip the tops into the egg wash and place atop the pie filling.
With a small knife, pierce the top of each pie.
You can either freeze the pies for later baking or bake them in a 190°C oven for 25 minutes.

How long you cook your pies will depend on the size. A larger pie will need to cook for a longer period.

Are you a meat pie connoisseur? Share your favourite meat pie with Jaci at jaci.hicken@mmg.com.au