It’s comfort food season, and due to overwhelming demand, Chef Jonathan Harris’s Not A Pot Pie is back on the menu at Linden in Hollywood.

Linden

Not A Pot Pie (Courtesy Linden)

Only 25 are made each night and take two full days to prepare, from the 24-hour slow-cooked Wagyu oxtail to the hybrid puff-croissant pastry. They sell out fast, get ’em while they’re hot.

 Inspired by the British meat pies Harris made during culinary training, he later reimagined them through his Jamaican heritage, creating something personal that also nods to the blended histories of both cuisines and cultures.

“Simply put, this dish came from a desire to make something that truly makes diners taste the effort behind it,” Harris tells LA Weekly from the kitchen of the Black-owned restaurant. “ When we began developing it, we wanted to take familiar ingredients and present them in a new way. I became fascinated by hand pies after working with a chef from New Zealand. At first, I couldn’t understand why people would spend so much time on them. But after watching him make one for a staff meal, I thought, ‘That’s an incredible dish.’

Linden

Chef Jonathan Harris (Emilio Sanchez)

“Everything we cook at Linden tells a story, and this one is essentially a history lesson on a plate, about Jamaica’s independence from the United Kingdom in 1962, and the foodways that reflect both oppression and resilience,” he says.  “We wanted to merge those influences, creating something that bridges an English hand pie with Jamaican flavors. You’ll find beef patties and short rib pies, but rarely a dish that brings both cultures together in one bite.

“The highs and lows of making this dish mirror its story,” he explains.  “A Wagyu oxtail filling packed with culture and history, its richness deepened through a slow, deliberate cooking process. This isn’t something we ever want to mass-produce. It’s meant to make people feel the hours of dough lamination, the braising, the care. When I shared it with a friend who’s both Jamaican and English, she said, ‘This reminds me of home.’ At that moment, I knew we’d done our job.”