Let's start on the filling. Pour some olive oil in a medium soup pot. Slice up a yellow onion and add it to the pot. Stir over medium heat until the onion is soft and translucent.

Meanwhile, combine the 1/2 cup of flour and the spices from the filling section in a medium mixing bowl. Add the beef and toss it a bit to coat.

Now pour some olive oil in a frying pan or a cast iron skillet over medium heat. When the oil is hot, start moving the dredged beef chunks, one by one, into the pan to brown. Brown the beef chunks on all sides, transferring each chunk in with your onions as it finishes browning.

Add the soup base and about 1 qt of water. Simmer gently until the beef is tender, and then reduce the mixture to a gravy-like consistency. When you're happy with the consistency, adjust the seasoning, then chill.

Set a pot of salted water to boil, then peel and dice the turnip to about 1/2" chunks or smaller. Add these to the boiling water and blanch for about 3 minutes, just until tender. Drain and chill.

Dice up those 2 oz of good cheddar to about the same size as the turnip chunks.

When the beef and turnips are cooled off, mix them together with the cheese. Give it a taste. If it's good enough that you want to eat it on it's own, then it's ready to go.

While your filling is in the works, you might also find time to start preparing the dough. Combine the 3 cups of flour with salt. Dice the butter and cut it in with a pastry knife.

Mix in the sourdough starter and the grated cheddar.

Knead in some small splashes of cold water, just until you can form a nice ball of firm, but elastic dough. Wrap the dough tight in plastic wrap and chill overnight, 8 hours or so.

Alright! Time for assembly. Pull out your dough to let it warm up a bit. Cut it in half. Grab 2 big sheets of parchment and a rolling pin.

When the dough has warmed up a bit and become more malleable, place one half between your 2 sheets of parchment and roll it out to about 1/8" thick.

At this point, you should get your oven on to 375F.

Cut out a big circle from your dough. I used a cake pan to make a circular mark. Then used a knife to cut the circle out. I ended up with somewhere around a 9" circle.

Place about 1/2 of your mix in the center of your dough round. Fold the dough closed over the filling and gently press the edges to seal.

Now you need to sorta carefully press that big meat lump out to fill the dough pocket and try to expel any excess air. You should be left with a narrow edge, and an evenly filled pocket of dough.

With the tines of a fork, crimp along that narrow edge of the pocket to pinch it tight. I start at one side and then line up the first tine of the fork with the last tine mark in the dough as I work all the way around.

Repeat from step 13 with the other half of your dough in order to make your second pastie.

Whisk together the egg and the water (the last 2 ingredients) and brush this mix over the pasties. This will give them a nice shine.