Classic Chicken Pot Pie

Name: Classic Chicken Pot Pie
Prep time: 40 min
Total time: 1 h 15 min
Yield: 6
Ingredients: 1/3 cup butter; 1/3 cup Gold Medal™ All Purpose Flour; 1/3 cup chopped onion; 1/2 teaspoon salt; 1/4 teaspoon pepper; 1 3/4 cups chicken broth; 2/3 cup milk; 2 1/2 to 3 cups cut-up cooked chicken or turkey; 1 box (10 oz) frozen peas and carrots; 1 box (14.1 oz) refrigerated Pillsbury™ Pie Crusts (2 Count), softened as directed on box

Ingredients:10
Servings:6

By Betty Crocker Kitchens(Opens in a new tab)Updated 09/19/2024

Classic Chicken Pot Pie

Ingredients:10
Servings:6

What is a classic chicken pot pie? It starts with a scratch sauce that’s made easily with just a few ingredients. We’ll show you how to master this sauce, even if it’s your first time making it. The fresh, flavorful sauce becomes the rich and luscious savory pie filling when mixed with cooked chicken and veggies. All this goodness gets tucked inside tender, flaky pie crust, for a decadent homemade chicken pot pie that beckons all to the table. It’s a perfect dinner to serve when the nights turn cold, as its comforting qualities warm you from the inside out.

Pot pies have roots going back to the early years of Egypt, when they were prepared for the pharaohs and the recipes were discovered written on tomb walls. Early on, they weren’t referred to as pies, but rather “coffins” because they contained meat, rather than sweet fillings. Both the savory fillings and the crusts have evolved over time, being perfected along the way as more ingredients and better techniques have been applied.

We have an entire collection of pot pie recipes. Every recipe will show you how to make homemade chicken pot pies you’ll love. The collection contains a variety of different flavors, prep times, methods, and “crusts”, so when the craving strikes, you can find a recipe that suits your family’s tastes, or the time you have to spend in the kitchen.

How to Make Chicken Pot Pie

We’ll break down the steps to show you how to make chicken pot pie you’ll be proud to serve and gets gobbled up in no time. These are the basic steps—follow the recipe for all the specifics:

Make the Filling

Melt butter in a saucepan and stir in flour, onion, salt, and pepper with a whisk and cook until bubbly. Add broth and milk and boil to thicken the mixture into a sauce. Stir in cooked chicken and frozen veggies to finish the savory pie filling.

Roll One Pastry for the Bottom Crust

Roll Pillsbury™ pie crusts into squares to become the bottom and top crusts of the pie. It’s easy to roll the pastry into a square—see the tip section of the recipe for our best helpful hints. It doesn’t have to be perfect—you’ll be fluting the pastry pieces together later to seal in the filling. Ease one crust into a 13-inch square pan to become the bottom crust.

Top with the Filling

Pour the chicken filling gets into the pastry-lined baking dish.

Roll the Top Crust

Roll out another square—this time an 11-inch one. Use a cookie cutter to cut out nice looking designs from the center, or if you don’t have small cookie cutters, use a paring knife to cut out about 1-inch shapes. Don’t throw the scraps. Center the crust (with the holes) over the filling. Arrange the dough cutout scraps on the top crust.

Flute the Pie Crust Edge

Fluting the edge of a crust not only adds a decorative touch but also helps keep the filling from bubbling over. New to fluting? See decorative fluted edges section in the how to make pie crust article.

Bake

Bake until the top crust is golden brown and baked throughout!

Preventing a Soggy Crust

For perfectly done pie crust, follow these tips we’ve discovered while creating recipes.

Select the Right Dish: Be sure to use a square glass baking dish for this recipe This pie has more filling than will fit in a 9-inch pie plate. Using a metal pan or a disposable aluminum pan will not bake the crust as nicely as a glass baking dish will.

Prep the Crusts: Soften the pie crusts as directed on the package before rolling and cutting them. Do not let them sit on the counter for longer than directed or the crusts can become overly soft, causing them to become soggy when baked.

Proper Venting: Cut shapes as directed in the top crust. These openings not only add an attractive touch but also allow steam to escape during baking, preventing the crust from becoming soggy.

Chicken Pot Pie Vegetables

Frozen peas and carrots are just the right size to get a nice distribution in every slice of this savory pie. Feel free to substitute fresh veggies for frozen, depending on what you have on hand or what you are in the mood for. You’ll need about 2 to 2 1/2 cups total. Cut your veggies into small pieces (about 1/2-inch in diameter), so they will be tender when baked, and well distributed. Try potatoes, sweet potatoes, bell peppers, broccoli, cauliflower, corn, mushrooms, or zucchini.

Substitutions to Save Time When Making Chicken Pot Pie

If you’re looking for ways to trim the prep time of this recipe, try any of these ideas, to get it into the oven (and therefore, into your stomach) even faster:

Buy Pre-chopped Onions: Many grocery stores carry pre-chopped onions in the refrigerated produce section or freezer section. They not only cut down on the chopping, but also eliminate the tears that can happen when chopping onions!

Start with Cut-Up Chicken: Either chop leftover chicken so it’s ready when you need it or purchase chopped cooked chicken in the meat aisle of your grocery store.

Roll the Crusts Ahead of Time: Roll the crusts as directed up to 2 hours in advance of when you’ll bake the recipe. If you like, ease the bottom crust into the glass baking dish, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate it until you’re ready to finish the recipe. For the top crust (or you could do this with both crusts), roll between sheets of waxed paper or parchment paper to the sizes directed in the recipe. Refrigerate the flat crusts (between both sheets of waxed or parchment paper) up to 2 hours. When you are ready to finish the pot pie, peel off the paper and continue as directed.

If you really are short on time, you could prepare our Easy Chicken Pot Pie, instead! This version of the delicious dinner dish takes only 10 minutes to get it into the oven, so dinner is ready even faster.

Storing and Reheating Chicken Pot Pie

For the best textures it’s best if this pot pie is served after baking. If you do find yourself with leftovers, you can wrap the remaining pieces in the dish and store in the refrigerator for up to 3 days.

To reheat, cut a serving and place it on a microwavable plate. Cover it loosely and microwave on medium-high (70%) 1 1/2 to 2 1/2 minutes or until the filling is heated through. The crust will not be as flaky as when freshly baked, as some moisture from the filling gets transferred to the crust during storage.

Frequently Asked Questions

Believe it or not, you don’t have to hack into the center of your pot pie to tell that it’s baked! Since this classic pot pie recipe makes its own easy sauce from scratch, it is warm when it’s placed into the pie crust-lined baking dish. Why does that matter? It means you do not need to test the center of the pot pie to be sure it’s done. The filling will be more than hot enough when you use the crust doneness cue—which is baking it until the top crust is golden brown. The bottom crust will also be done at the same time, without further testing—see Preventing a Soggy Crust section above, for our best tips and tricks.

Blind baking (partially baking) a bottom crust is usually done when the filling for a one-crust pie is so runny that it can cause the bottom crust to be soggy when baked, if not partially baked first. That is not the case with this pot pie. The filling isn’t that runny this recipe requires the bottom and a top crust to get sealed together before baking to enclose the filling inside. Follow the tips in the preventing a soggy crust section above and skip partially baking the bottom crust.