This Gluten-Free Tourtière Recipe is full of all of the flavours and textures of the traditional pie, just without the gluten!
Note: This recipe was first posted on my original blog, Celebration Generation, on February 2, 2012. It was transferred over to this blog - existing comments and all - on 3/4/2021. It was most recently updated on 11/20/22.
The cabinets are built, the countertops installed, backsplash set, everything grouted, and the sink, dishwasher, and stove are all hooked up!
*CANNOT* tell you how good it feels to have some culinary autonomy back.
We haven't had the use of the dishwasher since May's tornado - it's been used to store the glassware ever since! We've been living off takeout.
While my access to the kitchen has been sporadic at best, my brain hasn't taken a break, so I've had this LONG list of ideas and theoretical recipes brewing, with no ability to do anything about it, short of write them down.
Torture.
One of the things I wanted to make this whole time was a proper French Canadian tourtiere (“Tourtière”, for those who are better with accents!)
What is Tourtiere?
Tourtière is a savoury meat pie - specifically, a French Canadian meat pie.
It’s popular in the province of Quebec, and in areas of Canada with high concentrations of French Canadians.
For many, it’s a thing for special occasions, especially around Christmas time.
The French-Canadian meat pie is traditionally served as part of Réveillon, a feast that happens after midnight mass on Christmas eve.
While half my family members are Quebecois, it hasn’t really been a Christmas tradition for me, so much as a cold weather thing.
I mostly had it during Festival Du Voyageur, growing up, and I’m just as likely to serve my version of tourtière for New Year’s Eve, as I am for Christmas!
I digress.
Early, original tourtières primarily featured wild game, while cooks today use ground meat - or a mixture of ground meat varieties.
(Personally, I’m in the “blend of meats” camp - mine is a beef and pork pie!)
Some people use mashed potatoes in their meat pie recipe, some use cubed potatoes... some will skip the carrots, others may skip the celery.
Most will feature warm spices, even if the spices / amounts used in the spice mix are a little different between recipes.
Gluten Free Tourtiere
Anyway, as part of the planning process, I worked on a basic gluten-free pastry crust that wouldn't make me grieve for my inability to eat wheat.
I did it - a gluten-free tourtiere!
Yesterday was my first day with the new kitchen, so I rolled out of bed and almost immediately went to buy groceries.
With 3 items I wanted to make, Tourtiere was to be made in the afternoon, closer to suppertime. Couldn't handle it, dug in to the preparation right away!
I tell ya, the filling, as it's cooking, smells amazing on the best of days. All those fresh veggies, herbs... yum.
The crust also turned out extremely well - you'd never peg it as being a gluten-free crust. Very rich and flaky!
Oh, so good. I just had some leftovers for breakfast - this gluten-free tourtiere recipe is definitely a winner!
Updating over a decade later: This has become my go-to recipe over the years since posting it!
Ingredients
While this recipe has a bit of a laundry list of ingredients to it, they’re all relatively simple ingredients that should be easy to find at any large grocery store.
A few notes for you:
Gluten Free Pie Crust Dough
I use my cream cheese based pastry recipe for the pastry shell when making tourtieres.
As with all of my gluten free baking, I use specific flours / proportions of those flours, chosen to best suit the particular recipe I’m working on.
This is one of my earliest gluten free recipes, and in the beginning, I DID use an “all purpose” gluten free flour mixture - it’s SO much better now!
White Rice Flour
Light Buckwheat Flour
Sorghum Flour
Sweet Rice Flour
Corn Starch
Xanthan Gum
In addition to those, you’ll need:
Cream Cheese
Unsalted butter
Large eggs
Salt
You’ll want a double pie crust, either way.
Don’t need it gluten free? I recommend my Great Uncle Tom’s Perfect Pie Crust recipe. So good!
The Meat Filling
The bulk of this ingredients in this recipe go in the filling. These ingredients are pretty straightforward:
Ground beef - or ground veal - and ground pork
Vegetables - carrots, potatoes, onion, and celery.
Herbs and spices: Fresh parsley, Dried Summer Savory, Bay Leaves, Ground Cloves, black pepper, salt
Liquid: Milk, and either beef or chicken broth.
Note: Can’t eat pork or beef? Neither can my husband, so I have since developed my Gluten-Free Chicken Mushroom Tourtiere - you would never know it’s not actually a ground beef / ground pork version!
Helpful Tips
A few words of advice before getting to the recipe:
Baking Your Tourtiere
I like to roll my dough on the silicone mat that came with my rolling pin, and use only the absolute minimum amount of cornstarch necessary to prevent it from sticking.
Corn starch is great for rolling dough out, but if you use too much, it’ll dry the dough out and make it crumbly.
It’s the best way to ensure you’re rolling your dough out to an even thickness - and you can set your thickness!
I like to use ⅛" for rolling out my pie shell.
For best results, let your filling cool before putting it in the pie pan.
Don’t skip the cooling - this helps prevent a soggy bottom crust!
I can be clumsy with oven mitts, and sing a cookie sheet prevents me from messing up the crust when moving it!
Serving Tourtiere
Tourtiere can be served warm or cold.
I usually serve the tourtiere fresh out of the oven - hot - and can go either way with the leftovers.
Chow Chow Relish is a traditional accompaniment that goes REALLY well with it!
Storage and Leftovers
Once baked - and cooled - tourtiere will keep in the fridge for at least a couple of days, I wouldn’t go more than 3-4 days though.
Keep it covered to prevent the filling from drying out - I like to use Cling Wrap.
More Canadian Recipes!
Looking for more recipes from the ‘great white north’? Look no further!
Chow Chow Relish
Elk Bourguignon
Gluten-Free Bacon Poutine Pizza
Gluten Free Beaver Tail Recipe
Gluten-Free Butter Tart Bars
Gluten Free Butter Tarts
Gluten-Free Cod Au Gratin
Gluten Free Cod Cheeks & Dressing
Gluten-Free Chicken Mushroom Tourtiere
Gluten Free Imperial Cookies Recipe
Gluten-Free Nanaimo Bar Brownies
Gluten Free Puffed Rice Bars
Gluten-Free Schmoo Torte
Looking for even more Canadian recipes? Check out our full Gluten-Free Canadian Recipes list!
Share the Love!
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Gluten-Free Tourtiere [French Canadian Meat Pie]
Equipment
Ingredients
Filling:
- 2 Carrots peeled and grated
- 2 Large Potatoes peeled and cut into ~ ⅓″ cubes
- 1 Small Onion finely chopped
- 4 Celery Ribs finely chopped
- 1 lb Ground Pork
- 1 lb Lean Ground Beef
- ½ cup Fresh Parsley chopped
- 1-2 tablespoon Dried Summer Savoury
- 2-3 teaspoon Ground Pepper
- 2 Bay Leaves
- 1 teaspoon Salt
- ¼ teaspoon Ground Cloves
- 2 cups Milk
- 1 ½ cups Beef or Chicken Broth
Dough:
- 1 cup White Rice Flour
- ¾ cup Light Buckwheat Flour
- ½ cup Sorghum Flour
- ¼ cup Sweet Rice Flour
- ¼ cup Corn Starch
- 2 teaspoon Xanthan Gum
- ¼ teaspoon Salt
- 8 oz Cream Cheese chopped
- ½ cup Unsalted butter cold and chopped
- ⅓ cup Cold Water
- 1 Large egg
Assembly:
- 1 Large Egg
- 1 tablespoon Cold Water
Instructions
Filling:
- After your carrots, potatoes, and onion are peeled and all of the veggies are chopped into small pieces, add them to a large skillet (a cast iron skillet works, I use nonstick), along with the meats and seasoning.
- Stir everything together until well mixed.
- Add the milk and the broth, stirring once again to fully combine.
- Bring this meat mixture to a boil over medium-high heat.
- Once boiling, turn the heat down to medium heat and simmer – stirring often – until the liquid has cooked off, and the meat has broken down almost to a paste. This should take about an hour, give or take.
- Once it’s ready, remove from heat and let the filling cool to room temperature.
Dough:
- Measure flours, corn starch, xanthan gum, and salt into the bowl of your food processor, blitz to combine.
- Add cream cheese, blitz a few times until mixture resembles gravel.
- Add butter, ¼ cup water, and egg. Blitz a few more times - just long enough to start to bring it together as a dough – you may need to use a little more water. Do NOT over-process it!
- Remove dough from processor, knead lightly to bring it together as a ball.
- Wrap in plastic wrap, chill for 1 hour before use.
Assembly:
- Preheat oven to 425 F
- Divide pie dough into 2 parts – one slightly bigger than the other.
- Roll the bigger section out as the bottom crust, use it to line a deep-dish pie plate / deep baking dish – carefully working it into the corners.
- Fill the lined pie pan with cooled filling, spreading it into the corners and mounding it in the center.
- Roll out the second part of dough as the top crust, cover the pie filling.
- Trim the excess dough and crimp the edges as desired, cut a couple of slits in it for steam vents.
- If desired, roll any extra dough very thin, cut into shapes, and apply to the crust for decoration.
- In a small bowl or mug, whisk the egg together with a little water. Use a pastry brush to coat the entire top of the tourtière with a thin coating of this egg wash.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 30-40 minutes until crust is golden brown.
- Serve warm or cold.
what kind of broth did you use ( beef broth?)
thanks
Beef, chicken, vegetable... whatever we have on hand and/or are in the mood for.
Do you think this could be frozen? After baked? Or before? Thinking Christmas!
I'd freeze before baking, but you could do it either way.
I just made this, and it was wonderful!! Since I already had a mini gluten free crust, I didn't use the crust recipe at this time. I split the filling between a ready made crust for my family and the little gf one for me, and everything came out just perfectly! So comforting and flavorful! This is one is a keeper. Thank you!
Oh wow, this recipe looks amazing! I'm always looking for gluten-free alternatives to traditional French Canadian dishes, and this meat pie looks like a perfect fit. Can't wait to try it out and see how it turns out! 😋