7. Strain the meat and vegetables, reserving the sauce. Spread the filling in an even layer in the base of the dish. Layer the potatoes on top of the filling. Pour the reserved sauce over the filling, until just below the top of the potatoes.

8. Roll the remaining pastry out on a floured work surface to a 3mm thickness, and cut to the size of the pie dish. Brush the strips of pastry on the rim of the dish with beaten egg, and place the pastry lid on top. Press the edges to seal, and brush the lid of the pie with the remaining beaten egg. Cut a few slits in the lid of the pie to allow steam to escape.

9. Cook in the preheated oven for 50–60 minutes, or until the pastry is golden-brown and the filling is bubbling inside.

10. Serve the hot pie with a side of green vegetables.

The Precious Stones series

The Precious Stones series

If you enjoyed A Season for Hope, you’ll love these other titles in Rosie Goodwin’s Precious Stones series

Read on for more . . .

The Winter Promise

1850.

When Opal Sharp finds herself and her younger siblings suddenly orphaned and destitute, she thinks things can get no worse. But soon three of them – including Opal – are struck down with the illness that took their father, and her brother Charlie is forced to make an impossible decision. Unable to afford a doctor, he knows the younger children will not survive. So, unbeknownst to Opal, Charlie takes their younger siblings to the workhouse. When she finds out, Opal is heartbroken.

Charlie starts taking risks to try to support what’s left of the Sharp family and earn Opal’s forgiveness, but he takes it too far and finds himself in trouble with the law. Soon, he is sent on a convict ship to Australia.

As poor Opal is forced to say goodbye to the final member of her family, she makes a promise to reunite them all one day.

Will she ever see her family again?

An Orphan’s Journey

1874.

Growing up in extreme poverty in London, Pearl thinks life can get no worse. But when her parents discover there’s yet another baby on the way, they have to tighten the belt even further. Pearl’s mother decides to send her and her younger sister Eliza to the workhouse, where they are forced into a new life of hardship and struggle.

Pearl’s hopes are raised when the workhouse offers the sisters a new life in Canada and they board an orphan ship transporting unwanted children across the seas. Pearl hopes their luck has finally changed when she and Eliza are hired by the kindly Mrs Forbes to work in her grand house together. But when Pearl meets their mistress’s bullying son Monty he reveals he will stop at nothing to make her life a misery.

Will Pearl ever find the home she so craves?

A Simple Wish

1885.