Dear Pie-man.com,

Yours is a fantastic website, great fun, very funny and all about pies. What's not to like?

I did notice that there is a distinct lack of information regarding piephilia outside Tyneside and the north, and nothing wrong with that, of course. Down here in the shandy-drinking bed-wetting south, the pie is possibly not as highly regarded as in the north but there are notable exceptions.

Coming from the East End of London (it has to be typed like that for reasons of tourism), pies were an important part of childhood. Pie and Mash Shops (tourism again) might seem like a cliche but done properly it is a true and genuine local food with a history and integrity. I have tried and failed many times to recreate the pie shop pie but to no avail. No amount of Google-ing provided any answers. I imagine that the recipes are jealously guarded family secrets.

I found a very fine regional dish on a market stall in Great Yarmouth in Norfolk (who incidentally sold only this). Freshly baked and still hot home made minced beef and onion pies into which you add mushy peas, vinegar, and get this, mint sauce! Crazy dish, crazy town.

If any of your readers venture even further south to the port towns of Kent I would recommend the finest "cornish" pasty I've ever tried. Seek out an independent family chain of butchers called Rook and Sons who do the best pasty. They do two types. Both hot and ready to go. The slightly more expensive one is larger and has puff pastry (a Bafta winner, say of Kevin Spacey status), but the Nobel peace prize and Oscar winner (de Niro, natch) is the smaller shortcrust cornish pasty. Superb, no-eggwash short pastry, with a thin veneer of crust concealing moist and gravy-laden pastry with a filling of finely minced lean beef, onion, a little carrot (sorry Cornwall) a little seasoning and the richest, almost black, gravy ever to be found in a baked, shop-bought product. Truly wonderful.

I enjoyed your pie reviews. I have experienced (tasted would be incorrect) the same pies as in your review. You are quite correct. Make your own, already!

Regards, Glenn

Labels: pies

Ah, a man after our own hearts. Check out The Guardian's Michael Hann in praise of pork pies.

Labels: pies

Now, you know pie-man's views on Fray Bentos, but, one man's poison is another man's meat. Can anyone put this poor man out of his misery?

Dear Pie-man,

I'm sending this to you since your web site is the only one I've found that seems to know much about Fray Bentos Pies. Back in the 1960's my mom used to get me a tinned meat pie like the ones from Fray Bentos, but I don't recall the brand, just that I seem to recall "Product Of Ireland", and the tin that you cut the lid off of and baked the whole thing in the oven. Was there another brand in a similar package of meat pies made in Ireland way back then?

Thanks for your time,

Danny

Labels: fray bentos