The BEST Chicken Pot Pie

For the filling:

1. Melt butter in a large Dutch oven or heavy bottom pot over medium heat. Add the onion, celery, carrots, and potato. Season with salt and pepper, then add the thyme and celery seed. Sauté until the onions are translucent and the veggies are tender, about 25-30 minutes. Stir occasionally so the vegetables don’t brown. Add the white wine and cook for about 1 minute so the alcohol burns off.
2. Stir in the chicken, peas, and flour. Stir and cook for about 3 minutes, stirring continuously, until the flour taste has been cooked out.
3. Stir in the chicken stock. Bring the mixture to a boil, stirring often, and cook until thickened, about 3-5 minutes. Stir in the cream cheese until melted. Turn off the heat and allow the filling to cool for about 10 minutes.

To assemble the pot pie:

1. To roll out the dough, place half of the dough on a countertop sprinkled with flour and sprinkle the dough with flour. Rub flour on the rolling pin and rap the dough with the rolling pin 6-8 times to soften it. Flip the dough over, lightly dust it with flour, and rap the dough again, this time in the opposite direction.
2. Starting from the middle of the dough, roll the dough away from you, giving it a quarter turn after each couple of passes. Flip the dough over and once again roll the dough from the middle outward, giving the dough a quarter turn each time, dusting the flour and the roller as needed.
3. Roll the dough to ¼-inch thickness and a few inches larger than your 9-inch glass pie pan. Gently fold the dough in half and in one movement, lift it off the rolling surface and into the pan. Unfold the dough circle and gently ease it into the pan. Don’t stretch the dough down into the pan or when it heats up in the oven, it will bounce back and shrink.
4. Preheat the oven to 400°F.
5. Scoop the slightly cooled chicken filling mixture into the pie pan, mounding in the middle if needed. Roll out your remaining disc of pie dough, then place over the top of the pie. Fold the top and bottom layers of pie dough under one another on the lip of the pie pan, making a big edge. Crimp the edge with the tines of a fork or flute the edge by pinching your knuckle into the middle of the index and middle finger of your opposite hand and repeat along the edges of the crust.
6. Whisk 1 egg with a splash of half and half or milk and brush on the top of the pie dough. Sprinkle with a bit of kosher salt and a few grinds of black pepper (optional). Cut 3 to 5 vents in the top of the pie. Place pie on a sheet pan and bake for 45-50 minutes, or until golden brown and bubbling. Cool for 10-30 minutes before serving for the filling to set.