Pie

My mum used to make amazing pies! Both my parents were good cooks, wonderful cooks, but mum was the pastry queen… she had different pastries for different things, pies or flans, mince-pies or tarts. I’m not in her class of pastry making, but I do make pies, and this evening we will be having a pie made with tenderloin of pork in a creamy mushroom sauce. We had the pork last night, and as there is some left over I thought I would give it a top and we would enjoy it tonight for our dinner.

I have mentioned before that Be-Ro was the flour my mum always used when I was a child; I have a little Be-Ro cookery book and I always use their recipes, but for pastry I know it off by heart – half fat to flour… so 8 ounces of plain flour and 4 ounces of lard and margarine. (You can use a vegetable shortening if you don’t like the idea of lard) A pinch of salt, a little cold water, and there is pastry! If you want a larger amount just double or triple the amounts, if you have any left over you can make jam tarts!

My mum used to make steak and kidney pie, chicken and bacon pie; she used to make fruit pies, usually apple, and she would make open fruit tarts and flans with an enriched pastry (add an egg yolk and a little sugar) She would make mince-pies which had a white pastry… I don’t know how, I can’t replicate it, mine always go brown! Sometimes she would make choux pastry, but whatever she made she would do it so quickly, and despite being supposed to have cold hands, her hot hands made the lightest most delicious crust you could imagine!

http://www.be-ro.co.uk/f_insp.htm