Comfort Foods--Even in the Summer!

I came across one of my favorite comfort foods on Everyday Food on PBS--pot pie.  I love pot pie and have tried many recipes.  This recipe has a very good flavor to it.  The "gravy" has a nice rich flavor although I did thicken it a bit more than the recipe called for.  These were made in invidivdual 12 oz. baking dishes.  I realized when I was assembling them that the gravy was still a bit thin, but after they were baked, we added cooked macaroni to them as we ate them (which we always do), and that really helped to soak up the gravy.  The puff pastry is delicious on top of the pot pies. 

Another recipe from PBS was a comfort food to serve alongside hamburgers--onion rings.  This recipe caught my attention because they are not fried but baked in the oven.  They have a unique batter of egg, buttermilk, flour, and cayenne pepper then they are dredged in a mixture of ground corn flakes and bread crumbs.  I used Panko crumbs.  The next time I make them, I plan to put half of the corn flake/bread crumb mixture on the plate at a time as it seemed to clump easily when the onion rings were dredged.  They were very good though and baked up nice and crisp.  They were a great addition to our meal of grilled hamburgers and cole slaw.

So if you need a little comfort--even in the summer, give one of these a try.