Two recipes in this collection are nearly the same dinner. The chicken and vegetable pot pie takes 55 minutes and uses a refrigerated crust. The chicken pot pie with homemade crust takes three hours and thirty-five minutes, and the filling is barely different. The entire gap is pastry. That is the most useful thing to know before you pick one, because it means you can decide how much of your evening this takes without changing what you end up eating.
So these are sorted by what goes on top, which is the decision that actually matters. Ten use a pastry crust, boxed or from scratch. Five are shepherds pies finished with mashed potato or cauliflower. Three are topped with refrigerated biscuit dough, one with tater tots, and two are built on pizza dough. Three have no topping at all and use a batter that separates in the oven and bakes its own crust underneath, which is the trick behind an impossible pie.
These are also the highest protein dinners on the site, which is what happens when a pound of meat feeds six. The range runs from 11 grams a serving for the vegetable and cheese pies to 46 grams for the chicken pot pie pasta, which takes 30 minutes and has no crust whatsoever. If you are feeding people who want a full meal out of one dish, almost anything on this page does it.
Times run from that 30-minute pasta to a slow cooker chicken pot pie at five and a quarter hours, and calories from 230 for a crustless tomato pie to 685 for the scratch crust pot pie. Each entry below lists what tops it, its real total time, how many it serves and its calories.
Chicken Pot Pies
Seven versions of the same idea with seven different lids. Two use boxed pastry, one makes its own, two use biscuit dough, and one skips the crust completely and becomes pasta.
Chicken and Vegetable Pot Pie
Eleven ingredients and 55 minutes, which makes it the fastest proper pot pie here. Two cups of cooked chicken and a cup of frozen peas and carrots in a butter and flour roux, under one refrigerated crust. This is the weeknight version. View the full recipe — 55 minutes · serves 6 · 461 calories
Double Crust Chicken Pot Pie
Pastry top and bottom from a boxed pair of crusts, with two and a half cups of shredded chicken, two cups of frozen mixed vegetables and poultry seasoning. At 379 calories it is the lightest of the crusted pot pies, because the filling is broth-based rather than cream. View the full recipe — 1 hour 20 minutes · serves 8 · 379 calories
Chicken Pot Pie with Homemade Crust
Nineteen ingredients, and the crust alone accounts for five of them, including a tablespoon of white vinegar, which keeps the gluten relaxed so the pastry stays tender. Potato and celery go into the filling. Three and a half hours, most of it dough. View the full recipe — 3 hours 35 minutes · serves 6 · 685 calories
Broccoli Cheddar Chicken Pot Pie
Built on rotisserie chicken and two cups of sharp cheddar with onion and chive cream cheese in the sauce, so it eats closer to a broccoli cheddar soup under pastry. Twenty-nine grams of protein a serving. View the full recipe — 1 hour 35 minutes · serves 8 · 493 calories
Homemade Chicken Pot Pie Casserole
A can of jumbo refrigerated biscuit dough replaces the pastry, which removes the only difficult step and adds a topping that soaks up gravy. Three cups of chicken, and the sauce is made from scratch rather than from soup. View the full recipe — 1 hour 5 minutes · serves 6 · 510 calories
Slow Cooker Chicken Pot Pie
Two and a half pounds of chicken breast with cream of chicken and cream of celery soup, five hours in the slow cooker, then biscuits baked on top at the end. Forty grams of protein a serving, the second highest number here. View the full recipe — 5 hours 15 minutes · serves 8 · 513 calories
Chicken Pot Pie Pasta
No crust and no oven. The same aromatics and roux, with rotini cooked directly in the broth and milk so the starch thickens the sauce. Thirty minutes, and 46 grams of protein, the highest in the collection. View the full recipe — 30 minutes · serves 4 · 615 calories
Shepherds Pie and Meat Pies
Six finished with potato rather than pastry. The spread between the longest and shortest is 45 minutes, and it comes down entirely to whether you mash the potatoes yourself.
Classic Shepherd’s Pie with Beef and Mashed Potatoes
Twenty-two ingredients, with two pounds of russets mashed with butter, half and half and Parmesan, over beef built up with Worcestershire, tomato paste, rosemary and thyme. This is the full version and it tastes like it. View the full recipe — 1 hour 25 minutes · serves 6 · 511 calories
Easy Ground Beef Shepherds Pie with Mixed Vegetables
Nine ingredients and four cups of already-made mashed potatoes, which is the single biggest shortcut available in this dish. Fifty-five minutes, 30 grams of protein, and it is the one to make on a weeknight. View the full recipe — 55 minutes · serves 4 · 433 calories
Wholesome Shepherd’s Pie with Cauliflower Mash
Potatoes cut with a whole head of cauliflower in the mash, and cremini mushrooms and carrot bulking out the beef. Twenty-one ingredients and 438 calories, lower than the classic despite being the larger dish. View the full recipe — 1 hour 5 minutes · serves 6 · 438 calories
Shepherds Pie Tater Tot Casserole
Two pounds of frozen tater tots instead of mash, over beef in cream of mushroom with two cups of cheddar. There is no mashing and no boiling, and the top comes out crisp rather than soft, which is the real argument for it. View the full recipe — 1 hour · serves 6 · 492 calories
Shepherds Pie with Pie Crust and Cheddar
The hybrid: a pie crust underneath, a pound and a half of beef and canned peas in the middle, mashed potato and a cup of cheddar on top. Forty-five minutes and 38 grams of protein, at 672 calories. View the full recipe — 45 minutes · serves 6 · 672 calories
Potato Topped Meat Pie
The British pub version, with twenty-four ounces of beef braised in stock with tomato paste and red wine vinegar before floury potatoes go over the top. The vinegar is what keeps it from tasting flat. View the full recipe — 1 hour 30 minutes · serves 6 · 428 calories
Cheeseburger and Pizza Pies
Five where the pie shape is doing something a sandwich normally does. Two make their own crust from a batter, two are built on dough, and one is a straight double crust.
Crustless Cheeseburger Pie
An impossible pie: a thin batter of two eggs, a cup of milk, half a cup of flour and baking powder is poured over the beef, and it sinks and bakes into its own crust underneath. Ten ingredients, 31 grams of protein. View the full recipe — 55 minutes · serves 6 · 410 calories
Ground Beef Cheeseburger Pie
The same trick with a heavier hand: four eggs and a full cup of flour, which gives a more substantial, almost quiche-like base. Nine ingredients and 397 calories, the lighter of the two cheeseburger pies. View the full recipe — 1 hour 5 minutes · serves 6 · 397 calories
Deep Dish Hamburger Pizza Pie
Yeast dough made from scratch with a cup of warm water and two teaspoons of yeast, then a pound of beef, eight ounces of Italian sausage and eight ounces of pepperoni. One hour fifty-five, most of it proving. View the full recipe — 1 hour 55 minutes · serves 8 · 561 calories
Stuffed Deep Dish Pizza Pie
Starts from a pound of bought pizza dough, which cuts an hour off the version above, with beef, peppers and two and a half cups of mozzarella sealed inside. Four hundred and seventy-five calories a slice. View the full recipe — 1 hour 15 minutes · serves 8 · 475 calories
Double Crust Pepperoni Sausage Pie
Two full pounds of meat between two boxed crusts: a pound of beef, a pound of Italian sausage and a cup of pepperoni, with mozzarella and cheddar. Fifty-five minutes and 645 calories, which is honest arithmetic. View the full recipe — 55 minutes · serves 8 · 645 calories
Quiche and Egg Pies
Four held together by eggs rather than gravy. These are the ones that work for brunch as readily as for dinner, and they are the lightest group here apart from the tomato pies.
Bacon Gruyere Quiche Lorraine
The traditional one, with a scratch crust made from a cup of flour and half a cup of cold butter, then four eggs, a cup of heavy cream, Gruyere and a pinch of nutmeg. Ten ingredients and no shortcuts. View the full recipe — 1 hour 45 minutes · serves 6 · 606 calories
Bacon and Cheese Crustless Quiche
The same idea with the pastry removed entirely, which drops it to 344 calories and 45 minutes. Six eggs, a cup of heavy cream and six slices of thick cut bacon straight into a buttered dish. View the full recipe — 45 minutes · serves 6 · 344 calories
Elegant Ricotta and Spinach Quiche
A cup of whole milk ricotta alongside the eggs and cream, which gives a looser, lighter set than a cheddar quiche. Two cups of fresh spinach wilted down first so it does not release water into the custard. View the full recipe — 1 hour 15 minutes · serves 8 · 405 calories
Sausage Gravy Biscuit Pie
Breakfast reassembled as a pie: a pound of sausage in milk gravy under refrigerated biscuits and a cup of cheddar. Eight ingredients, 45 minutes and 21 grams of protein, and it works for dinner without apology. View the full recipe — 45 minutes · serves 6 · 409 calories
Tomato, Vegetable and Fish Pies
Three without ground meat. Two are Southern tomato pies, which are a genuinely different thing from anything else on this page, and one uses an almond flour crust.
Bacon Onion Tomato Pie
The Southern classic: sliced tomatoes and caramelized onion with eight slices of bacon in a deep dish crust, bound with mayonnaise, sour cream and mozzarella. Best in late summer when the tomatoes are worth it. View the full recipe — 1 hour 5 minutes · serves 8 · 403 calories
Crustless Cheesy Tomato Pie
Eight ingredients, no crust and no meat, which brings it to 230 calories, the lightest recipe in the collection. Three large tomatoes, two cheeses, a third of a cup of mayonnaise and a quarter cup of fresh basil. View the full recipe — 1 hour · serves 6 · 230 calories
Almond Flour Tuna Pie
Two cups of almond flour make the crust, so this one is gluten free without substituting anything into a wheat recipe. Two cans of tuna, sharp cheddar and green beans, for 25 grams of protein a serving. View the full recipe — 50 minutes · serves 6 · 494 calories
Savory Pie Questions Worth Answering First
What is the difference between shepherds pie and cottage pie?
Traditionally shepherds pie is made with lamb and cottage pie with beef, which is where the shepherd in the name comes from. All five of the shepherds pies in this collection use ground beef, which makes them cottage pies by the strict definition, and the same is true of nearly every American recipe using the name. It is worth knowing if a British cook ever corrects you, and it changes nothing about how any of them are made. Swap in ground lamb and any of the five becomes a shepherds pie in the original sense.
Is a refrigerated pie crust good enough for a pot pie?
For most of these, yes, and the collection is built on that assumption. Compare the chicken and vegetable pot pie at 55 minutes with the homemade crust version at three hours thirty-five, where the fillings are close cousins. The pastry is where almost all of that extra time goes. Where scratch pastry genuinely earns it is in a top-and-bottom pie that has to hold a wet filling without going soggy, because you control the thickness and the fat. For a single-crust lid over gravy, the boxed crust does the same job.
How do I stop the bottom crust going soggy?
Blind bake it. Line the crust, fill it with weights or dried beans and bake it at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for about 15 minutes before the filling goes in, which sets the starch before it ever meets liquid. The second thing that helps is letting the filling cool before it goes into raw pastry, because hot gravy melts the fat in the dough and that is what makes it greasy rather than flaky. If neither appeals, the three crustless pies and the five potato-topped pies here avoid the problem entirely.
What makes an impossible pie form its own crust?
A thin batter of egg, milk and a small amount of self-rising or baking-powder flour separates as it bakes. The flour and some of the egg sink and set into a soft crust layer on the bottom while the rest stays custardy above the filling. Both cheeseburger pies here work this way, and the difference between them is telling: half a cup of flour and two eggs gives a thin, barely-there base, while a full cup of flour and four eggs gives something close to a quiche. There is no pastry and no rolling involved either way.
Can savory pies be frozen?
Yes, and they are among the better things to freeze. Assemble the pot pies and shepherds pies unbaked, wrap them well and freeze for up to three months, then bake from frozen with about 20 extra minutes and a foil cover for the first half so the top does not burn ahead of the middle. The exceptions are the quiches and the tomato pies, which both weep on thawing, and anything topped with biscuit dough, which should go on fresh rather than be frozen raw.
More Collections to Cook From
These overlap with the page above in places, each sorted on a different question.
- 25 Pie Recipes — The sweet side: apple, pumpkin, pecan, cream and fruit pies.
- 25 Casserole Recipes — Where the potato-topped and biscuit-topped bakes have company.
- 20 Ground Beef Dinners — More of the beef half of this list.
- 25 Chicken Recipes — Beyond the seven pot pies above.
- 25 Breakfast Recipes — If the quiche group was what you came for.
Browse all of our recipe collections.
