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The first seven posts of this thread moved from Letters from Hell.

He has never eaten my pork pies. André, one day I'll bring a pork pie to a tasting you attend and you will see what the fuss is all about.

djewesbury wrote:He has never eaten my pork pies. André, one day I'll bring a pork pie to a tasting you attend and you will see what the fuss is all about.

Thanks, I'll look forward to this. If you bring pork pies, I'll bring a bottle of claret.

I'd also like to put my name down for a helping of DJ pork pie. Last (and only) time I was anywhere near a DJ pork pie in London I only managed a few crumbs.

Perhaps we should hold a pork pie and port tasting one day.

AHB wrote:Last (and only) time I was anywhere near a DJ pork pie in London I only managed a few crumbs.

Sorry. That might be because I was unleashed in its vicinity before you arrived. Next time I’ll try to be more moderate in my appetite (but you should know that there is no greater love, etc).

AHB wrote:I'd also like to put my name down for a helping of DJ pork pie. Last (and only) time I was anywhere near a DJ pork pie in London I only managed a few crumbs.

Perhaps we should hold a pork pie and port tasting one day.

Are you aware of this event? I think it could be quite splendid. And I am envisaging pork d'oeuvres. My pork pies are rather peppery, so need to be eaten a little while before concentrated tasting is undertaken - but for this get-together I was thinking of developing a new less seasoned version (in addition, not instead of!) so perhaps that will be OK alongside. I have also been asked if I could produce a take-away pie for Derek's father-in-law. This will be a porktastic night and it would be madness to miss it.

AHB wrote:I'd also like to put my name down for a helping of DJ pork pie. Last (and only) time I was anywhere near a DJ pork pie in London I only managed a few crumbs.

Perhaps we should hold a pork pie and port tasting one day.

[MontyPython]Crumbs?! We used to dream of crumbs; the best we could manage was to lick t'dust off t'floor after t'pie had been in t'room...[/MontyPython]
I too would like to try the famous DJ pies; especially if he made one including black pudding (my favourite pork pie is a locally made pork and black pudding pie, delicious).

That should be doable. I also make a very nice pork and game pie.
We should separate this thread out - maybe it should go under 'Beer, Whisky, Cigars and Pork Pies'!

I don't know what to say … I feel overcome … Thank you everyone, this is a very emotional moment but (unfolds scrappy piece of of A4) I did prepare a few words for an eventuality such as this …
First I should thank my agent, Derek, and, oh er, I need to thank Julian for eating that first pork pie I brought to the Bung Hole so enthusiastically that it afterwards became legendary amongst those who didn't get any … er and of course the people of Belfast —
(slow hand clap begins)

I suppose I could even start taking orders and researching rigid pie shippers. I wonder if a wine bottle shipper can be converted into a pork pie shipper.

Design your business assuming that it grows. Can you make hundreds of PPs a week? What price would make that worthwhile?

Also, you need an affectation. (Well, another.) Link your two professions. In each PP package add something from your academic side. Perhaps an essay question — of course a different one each week. And an ideal answer to the previous week’s question. Or something.

And I remind you that one of our number works for a shipping company (reminder by PM, if needed).

This could really take off. I mean, really.

Should I be offended that there has been no offer of Daniel's Proper Pork Pies (tm) for the Pre-Harvest Tour Tasting?

Are Americans not worthy of a proper pork pie?

Do I need to make a counter-offer of Glenn's Brilliant Barbeque Beef Brisket?

Glenn E. wrote:Should I be offended that there has been no offer of Daniel's Proper Pork Pies (tm) for the Pre-Harvest Tour Tasting?

Are Americans not worthy of a proper pork pie?

Do I need to make a counter-offer of Glenn's Brilliant Barbeque Beef Brisket?

Glenn, I will do my very best! Demand is suddenly booming.

EDIT: Although I said I'd bring one to the next tasting André and I were both at, which could very well be this (apart from our impending Mosel / Rheingau tour in a couple of weeks!)

Daniel, I wonder if you'll be wearing a port pie hat while serving the port pies. You could put the logo of your port pie company on the crown of the hat.

AW77 wrote:Daniel, I wonder if you'll be wearing a port pie hat while serving the port pies. You could put the logo of your port pie company on the crown of the hat.

You wrote 'port pies' instead of 'pork pies'. And by god, I think you've hit on something. Certainly worth a little experimenting. Yes, I can see it now..
Experiments to be undertaken when I return home!

djewesbury wrote:I suppose I could even start taking orders and researching rigid pie shippers. I wonder if a wine bottle shipper can be converted into a pork pie shipper.

I once sent a consignment of emergency pork pies to Paris* using a whisky tube as a protective shipper. They were round, single-portion size pork pies and I believe the arrived intact although the one without the supermarket preservatives was rather fuzzy and green.


*The name of the recipient will remain a secret.

djewesbury wrote:You wrote 'port pies' instead of 'pork pies'.

I think this is a Freudian slip that is completely explainable here on the Port Forum. So now you want to marinate the pork in port? Perhaps you should add some vinegar to make the port less sweet. At least that's how we do it with "Sauerbraten":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sauerbraten (But we use red wine). You will taste this one when in Cologne, I promise.

AW77 wrote:

djewesbury wrote:You wrote 'port pies' instead of 'pork pies'.

I think this is a Freudian slip that is completely explainable here on the Port Forum. So now you want to marinate the pork in port? Perhaps you should add some vinegar to make the port less sweet. At least that's how we do it with "Sauerbraten":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sauerbraten (But we use red wine). You will taste this one when in Cologne, I promise.

Oh yes! This is exactly the way to do it. The herbs and the other seasonings (secret receipt, etc etc etc) can be marinaded with port. In fact that's how I make a pork and game pie (with venison and rabbit), now that I think of it.
I want to try the Sauerbraten made with the traditional horsemeat. Is this possible?

Yes, you can get it here:
http://www.kleine-glocke.de
But they only open at 4 p.m. so we cannot have lunch there.

AW77 wrote:Yes, you can get it here:
http://www.kleine-glocke.de
But they only open at 4 p.m. so we cannot have lunch there.

Shame. Maybe a little horse snack between lunch and dinner.

So, who's ordering a pork pie then? Nothing will be made until September as I'm not in my kitchen until then. I can do medium or large. I do not do small.

djewesbury wrote:I can do medium or large. I do not do small.

So many jokes.

What is the difference between "traditional horsemeat" and "horsemeat"? Does the former have a more conservative outlook on life?

DRT wrote:

djewesbury wrote:I can do medium or large. I do not do small.

So many jokes.

What is the difference between "traditional horsemeat" and "horsemeat"? Does the former have a more conservative outlook on life?

Traditional horsemeat is labelled as horsemeat. Horsemeat is labelled as lasagne.

DRT wrote: What is the difference between "traditional horsemeat" and "horsemeat"?

Eating traditional horsemeat will make you neigh like a horse. But this side effect is said to last just for an hour.

AW77 wrote:

DRT wrote: What is the difference between "traditional horsemeat" and "horsemeat"?

Eating traditional horsemeat will make you neigh like a horse. But this side effect is said to last just for an hour.

The nicest horsemeat I ever ate was the horse steak I had in Verona, sitting at an outside table as the sun set over the square. No, the horse carpaccio in Venice, sitting at an outside table as the sun set over the square …

I have only eaten horse steak on one occasion - for lunch and dinner for seven consecutive days whilst holidaying in France. No more that 2.5 horses suffered as a result of my holiday.

I have never eaten Aldi lasagne but suspect it is rather nice.

Ireland is full of horses.

Could one make it into a DJPP?

Rather difficult to procure legally. Silly food (by which I mean crocodile, alligator, ostrich, etc etc) is alas more easy to find than proper, tasty horsemeat.
And I think I don't want to start a sentence here that includes the words 'import' and 'horse'.
Oops, I have.

Can you carry bits of dead horse whilst travelling through open borders within the EU?

DRT wrote:Can you carry bits of dead horse whilst travelling through open borders within the EU?

Depends. Different states can impose their own restrictions. NI typically takes a dim view of it (ever since the last Foot & Mouth outbreak). Until very recently they had announcements saying that anyone who had been on a farm had to report to an official at the airport. But always worth trying to smuggle something through, I mean plenty of holidaymakers must do so surely?
I am holding back on so many jokes, because this is a serious thread, and I want people to try my pork-port pies.

You could order ingredients from here.

I have already placed an order for 1 x large DGPP.

Please may I order 1 x large DGEMP?

DRT wrote:You could order ingredients from here.

I have already placed an order for 1 x large DGPP.

Please may I order 1 x large DGEMP?

DGEMP?

Derbyshire, I see. Trouble is, if you're paying full retail whack for meat like that, your resultant pie is going to be v v expensive.

What is the approximate cost of the ingredients of a DJPP?

What weight of animal bits is required?

I strongly suspect that the regulars of TPF tastings would stump up for a horse, camel, crocodile, impala, zebra and edible insect pie.

I'm in.

Pork for me please. But the question about costs was sensible.

jdaw1 wrote:Pork for me please. But the question about costs was sensible.

Is your implied objection on the basis of squeamishness or conservationism? Or something else?

Whilst I would not wish to eat an endangered species pie I think that those listed on the site linked to are sustainable species and therefore available "game".

DRT wrote:Is your implied objection on the basis of squeamishness or conservationism? Or something else?

Choose one:

1. Dear Symingtons: I like your Graham and Dow Ports, a lot, so please use those grapes and your time and effort to make Champagne.

2. I like what you do. Please do it more.


I like Daniel’s Pork Pies. Should I become over-PP’d, I might request different. Until when, my Pork Pie cellar is not full.

djewesbury wrote:So, who's ordering a pork pie then? Nothing will be made until September as I'm not in my kitchen until then. I can do medium or large. I do not do small.

Most definitely; medium size preferred for me. Bonus pies with game, apple or black pudding welcome.

Hello again porksters. When I used to sell these pies to Rachel's boat, for their platters, I would sell the 4" round ones for about £4 - £5, negotiable, depending on how many I'd made and what the outlay on the ingredients was (buying the meat through their butcher meant a discount on my materials). This included only a very minimal percentage for my labour and I don't think I was making a profit particularly. The main ingredient of the pie is pork shoulder, which is chopped not minced, by hand. Just that bit takes some time. I would base my other quantities of ingredients around the amount of pork shoulder I had, make up a mix and make as many pies as I could with that. Then there's the jelly, which is made from scratch, in advance, by making a slow-cooked stock with the most collagenous cuts you can find (usually trotters). The stock can be made in a large batch and frozen (ice-cube bags are particularly handy). The pastry is the easy bit; but the time-consuming element is the cooking and filling: cook for a couple of hours, turn out, cool, glaze, return to the oven, allow to cool slightly, fill with stock, chill overnight.

The large pies I think I have only made as gifts; I am consulting as we speak to verify whether any has ever been sold by me.

If only a mathematician could tell me:

• assuming a mix based on 1 kg of pork shoulder (before other cuts / ingredients added) could make about 3½ to 4 4"/10 cm round pies (where the tin is about 9 cm high) ;
• bearing in mind that the ratio pastry : meat will be smaller in a larger tin ;
• given a tin of internal dimensions approx 23 x 13 x 7 cms (this is guesswork, I don't have the tins here), and pastry with a thickness of approx 1½ cm ;

how much large pie will that quantity of mix produce?

(BTW I have just figured out how to assign a keyboard shortcut, on a Mac, to give me ½, ¼, and ¾, without having to go to the Character Viewer!)

Delightfully mixed Imperial and metric units.

The medium pie is a circle 3¾″ in diameter, and 3½″ high. Pastry thickness (top, bottom, and sides) is assumed to be ⅗″, so the volume of meat is about π × 1.275″² × 2.3″ ≈ 11¾″″″.

The large pie fills a box about 9″ × 5.1″ × 2¾″ inches, so the volume of meat is about 47⅞″″″, which is just over four times as much meat as a medium.

Please could somebody check that pastry width has been subtracted the correct number of times.

jdaw1 wrote:

DRT wrote:Is your implied objection on the basis of squeamishness or conservationism? Or something else?

Choose one:

1. Dear Symingtons: I like your Graham and Dow Ports, a lot, so please use those grapes and your time and effort to make Champagne.

2. I like what you do. Please do it more.


I like Daniel’s Pork Pies. Should I become over-PP’d, I might request different. Until when, my Pork Pie cellar is not full.

3. Dear Symingtons: I have heard that you make great Port but have never been so fortunate as to try one. Please keep making Port so that I may some day have that opportunity.

Chopped shoulder. Yum! Over here we call that pork butt and we barbeque it for 12-16 hours to cook it. I will explain why in September at TBH, though those with insufficient patience can probably Google the answer. Some day... I should barbeque some pork butt for Daniel to make into pork pies. THAT would be epic.

jdaw1 wrote:Delightfully mixed Imperial and metric units.

The medium pie is a circle 3¾″ in diameter, and 3½″ high. Pastry thickness (top, bottom, and sides) is assumed to be ⅗″, so the volume of meat is about π × 1.275″² × 2.3″ ≈ 11¾″″″.

The large pie fills a box about 9″ × 5.1″ × 2¾″ inches, so the volume of meat is about 47⅞″″″, which is just over four times as much meat as a medium.

Please could somebody check that pastry width has been subtracted the correct number of times.

Does """ = "³?

Glenn E. wrote:I should barbeque some pork butt for Daniel to make into pork pies. THAT would be epic.

Yes you should. If we discovered a way of getting said butt to me before our meeting I could even try and use it.. but the logistics of that would be fiercely complex I fear.

djewesbury wrote:Does """ = "³?

Cubic inches = ″³, yes, but after your comment about special characters I thought it best to use the correct prime character (“″”), rather than the uncurled double quotation mark (“"”).

jdaw1 wrote:

djewesbury wrote:Does """ = "³?

Cubic inches, yes, but after your comment about special characters I thought it best to use the correct prime character (“″”), rather than the uncurled double quotation mark (“"”).

I thought about it. Then decided I couldn't be bothered.

jdaw1 wrote:9″ × 5.1″ × 2¾″ inches

Tut. Shades of "The TPF" all over again.

jdaw1 wrote:47⅞″″″

Also understandable, but odd; use of ″ for inches is fine, but use of three of them...?
I'm sure I've seen most of "cu in" most commonly, and in³ would seem to be in common use, but not ″″″ or ″³.

PhilW wrote:

jdaw1 wrote:9″ × 5.1″ × 2¾″ inches

Tut. Shades of "The TPF" all over again.

{Sackcloth and ashes}