Seriously Mixed-Up Pie - with salsa, sausage and short-crust

Preparation Time: About 1 hour total

Here goes....
Starting this one with "I really don't know how this is going to work" was very honest & far from encouraging!

Step 1: I roughly chopped the vegetables and chucked them into our trusty non-stick sauce pan to shallow fry in a drizzle of oil on a gentle heat. I was careful to add the onion and garlic last because I read somewhere recently that was important - which surprised me.

Step 2: Slopped our bit of salsa into the pan as some form of sauce. Then squeezed in a lime that (to look at) had seen better days - lime & salsa are obviously brilliant when in bed (or in this case a sauce) together.

Step 3: Time for the meat - sorry to vegetarian friends. First, two sausages we had, I chopped into meatball-like pieces and threw into the veggie mix. As if that wasn't enough, I added some left-over chunks of cooked chicken.

Step 4: Then seasoned the mix with some salt, pepper & a spice mix from the cupboard. Before adding a small amount of creme fraiche that was still lurking in the fridge, and we all know that creme fraiche, salsa & lime is just a three-way on the tongue! If you need other ways to expand the sauce,  I imagine some tomato puree, some thick gravy from granules or tomato ketchup would all help you out.  (Actually writing that down inspired the hell out of me, so I sprinkled on some gravy granules...don't tell my granny. And I boiled the kettle  and poured over a tiny splosh of hot water).

Step 5: Into the pie dish it goes.  I am particularly proud of my pie dish - its a recent investment, its the ideal size for two people and Jamie Oliver would be proud - it's proper retro!!

Step 6: With the mixture in the dish, I added a generous, yet cheeky, helping of grated parmesan. Why? you say! Because: 
a) we had some.
b) cheese is always a winner!!

Step 7: Now here was the tricky bit - as we didn't have much pastry left over from when I learnt to make a lemon tart (yum yum by the way, but that's not for here). We had short crust left over - put obviously puff pastry works and to be honest who doesn't like a puff topping more anyway? The amount I had wasn't wide enough to cover completely, so it needed a gentle cajole and a delicate stretch - never easy and requires patience.  At the very edge (lengthwise) there was some excess to be trimmed so I attempted to fashion an F (for Fridge Challenge obviously). Before lovingly slotting the whole creation into the oven (wearing oven gloves to be a good role model) I wiped the pasty top with a finger of butter (always best a room temperature), because I hear pastry loves a smearing of butter.

Step 8: The pie cooked away in the oven which I pre-heated to 190C (the hottest ours gets) for 25 minutes.

Step 9: After removing from the oven, I served up generous amounts on plates with some garlic bread that we had going spare.

Flatmate's Verdict?  I thought it was very tasty.  Given that I didn't know what to think due to the "I really don't know how this is going to work" comment, I was pleasantly surprised.  The sauce was very flavorful, which was very much due to the last minute lime addition.  I personally wouldn't have gone for the choice of the caramelized red onion sausage only because I am not the biggest fan of the flavour, but overall I was quite pleased. I mean really, you can't go wrong with anything that has a pastry crust now, can you?