Helter skelter, in a summer swelter

[venta]

Yesterday, an email arrived to a mailing list I'm on, saying the following:

Today, I had the pleasure of introducing a German colleague to his first ever pie :).

I read that a couple of times, and was very confused. Subsequent emails clarified:

1. You don't really get pies in Germany. Certainly not savoury pies.
2. Said German colleague has been living in the UK a few years, and has regarded pies as suspicious, peculiar, scary British things to be avoided.
3. You really don't really get pies in Germany.

Yes, yes, I know that things like steak-and-kidney pie are regarded as Proper British Food, but I hadn't realised the extent to which the rest of the world doesn't really do pie. The Wikipedia page for pie describes meat pies as "popular in the UK, Australia and New Zealand".

Now. Really. In this age of multiculturalism, where the hell is the rest of the world? Why haven't they caught on? Admittedly, subsequent pages (eg for the Scotch pie) mention popularity in Canada, and they have that pot pie thing going on in America, but even so...

Where is the rest of Europe in the pie stakes? Never mind your galettes and your tartes, savoury pie is something they really should know about. More to the point, why aren't we going out there and setting up pie stalls for their education? They keep sending us their peculiar comestibles in fancy markets, we should reciprocate. "Getting an English" on the way home from the Bierkeller could be the new fashionable thing in Bavaria by summer.

Incidentally, the occasional European market in the Broadway, in Ealing, has a stall whose sign reads:

German Bratwurst

After Party

There are many readings of that which are just Not Right.

Comments

[hoiho.livejournal.com]

Indeed; when I worked in Nice, my French colleagues were suspicious of pies, whereas I missed them mightily.

[marjory.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah! The Germans don't really 'get' savoury pastry. They will happily eat latticey things with apple, cherries et al in them, but savoury? Fuggedaboudit! I once got a currywurst decorously wrapped in a square of puff pastry in Göttingen, but this was a novelty.

This also opens up the fish and chip debate. The crimes committed in the name of fish and chips in the rest of the world? Preposterous! Scandalous!

Let's buy up a load of Fray Bentos and Harry Ramsdens and hot the Weihnachtsmarkt circuit now!

[venta.livejournal.com]

What a fantastic icon. Why do I mess about putting little pastry leaves on the top of pies when I could be putting symbols like that on them?

[venta.livejournal.com]

In fairness, there are some fairly heinous things perpetrated in the name of fish and chips in the UK as well. I'm in with your Weinachtsmarkt plan, so long as we can declare an international embargo on mushy peas.

[marjory.livejournal.com]

We could substitute guacamole! ;-) However, curry sauce stays. They have to learn.

[nalsa.livejournal.com]

Wait, what? No pie? That's just wrong.

BTW, whilst on recent trip to Spain I did notice pasties in the little supermarket around the corner. Some of them were wrong (contaning things like tuna, for example), but at least there was a stab at the genre.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Get thee behind me, Mandelson.

No, wait, don't: stay exactly where I can see you.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Hmm... I'm not a purist where pasties are concerned. I've tested out some of the West Cornwall Pasty Company's more deranged ideas while touring the railway network of our fair isle. But tuna ? Definitely beyond the pale.

WCPC's "Boxing Day Pasty" (turkey, cranberry, sausage, veg) sampled last week ought to have been a work of genius, but was sadly poorly executed. Tomato and mozarella remains an unexpected (if frequently lethally hot) favourite.

[rabbit1080.livejournal.com]

i dunno. i had assumed that pork-pies were german. then i moved to england and found out that pork-pies (the molten mayberry ones) are english. still haven't been brave enough to eat any of 'em :-)

unrelatedly, i'm really looking forward to my remy martin xmas pudding from waitrose wot i'm importing to the colonies.

[rabbit1080.livejournal.com]

heh. :)

[venta.livejournal.com]

You, a seasoned traveller of forn parts, afraid to eat a pork pie?

I concede, I don't think pork pies are really the peak of UK pie-related achievement. They're not bad, though! Decent ones are really quite nice!

[rabbit1080.livejournal.com]

:-) not as scared as i am of mushy-peas or black-pudding.
so, what's a good brand of pork-pie then? just in case i find any around here. could happen.

[glamwhorebunni.livejournal.com]

McVities Chocolate Hobnobs are the best food to impress foreigners with.

But yes, American Pies are all tarts or similar and sweet and argh! That's not a pie! We had this discussion at my American friend's Thanksgiving party recently...

[valkyriekaren.livejournal.com]

Bah. I sniff at their non-pie-eating habits.

[d-floorlandmine.livejournal.com]

Ah, the much-discussed nature of the pie ... the cause of the celebrated Pie-Off series, with a series of ever more abstruse categories - "Best true savoury pie", "Best faux sweet pie", "Award for structural integrity", and so on ...

[venta.livejournal.com]

Mushy peas: fair point. They're flippin' vile.
Black pud: you fool, it's the breakfast food of the gods.

"Melton Mowbray" is one of them controlled wossnames, like "Champagne" and is in theory jealously guarded. Actual brands I'm a bit vague on: I'd say Taylors, but that's probably only useful if you live in Darlington!

Others might know better brands to watch out for in them there colonies.

Or come and visit us, and I'll provide proper regional fayre... I'll even break out the griddle and make singin' hinnies :)

[hirez.livejournal.com]

'Traditional' Cornish pasties from Wisconsin are an experience.

[pseudomonas.livejournal.com]

That sounds verging on calzone.

[ewx.livejournal.com]

The book I am reading, Montaillou, documents that the medieval Occitan [i.e. south French] shepherd Pierre Maury was in the habit of making “enormous pies” variously for his friends or in one case to bribe the men sent to confiscate his employer's sheep.

It's not stated what went into the pies but frankly it's not hard to guess!

[ewx.livejournal.com]

Concerning the French and Fray Bentos pies

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

Heh, I made a pie with exactly that on top once, when living at Byzantium I think. We should have invited you round!

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

Empanadas! They're great. I believe that they originate in Galicia, the most Celtic area of Spain, so it may be that they have a common heritage with the Cornish variety.

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

I wonder if potato-topped pies (shepherd's, cottage, fishermans's) are known more widely than proper pastry ones?

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

(Then there was another one with "Jesu" lettered on the top.)

[fractalgeek.livejournal.com]

There are many things like the Greek/Cypriot little pasties or Jamaican Patties, but I absolutely agree that true English pastry is missing elsewhere, whether Suet,Salt crust, Shortcrust or flaky. It is one of our contribution to world cuisine!