Alex's Pie Stands

[Alf]

Anyone remember the Pie wagon outside Snowhill Station which was open into the night. Also we could get the Sunday Mercury about 1.00am in the morning while waiting for the all night Bus Service.

 

[dennis]

Snowhill

Hi Alf,
Yes mate,do remember the pie wagon outside the station,When going home from Springhill Ice rink on a Saturday night, we would walk to the station
and get a "Hot Dog" and pick up the "Sunday Merc" to read while waiting for the last bus home

 

[hmld]

:wink:
ABSOLUTELY. A LONG WAGON APRX 16' AS A MOBILE KITCHEN WHICH SERVED THE MOST GOD AWFUL STEAK AND KIDNEY PIES AND ANAEMIC TEA AND INSTANT COFFEE WITH STERILIZED MILK. HOT DOGS WERE IN WHITE BREAD ROLLS WITH SOME SORT OF PICKLED SLICED ONIONS WITH OPTION OF YELLOW MUSTARD, BROWN HP SAUCE, HEINZ KETSUP, POWDER SALT AND/OR LIGHT COLOUR PEPPER. THE HOT BREW, INCLUDING TART BOVRIL, WAS SCALDING. APPARENTLY SCORCHED TOAST COULD BE HAD AT PREMIUM.

IT IS REMEMBERED ASTUTELY WELL BY THE CORRESPONDENT AMONGST WHOM SUGGESTED RECOLLECTION OF THE SLOPE ABOUT SNOW HILL RAILWAY STATION AS ON THE RC CATHEDRAL SIDE.

THE FACILITY WAS A RENDEZVOUS OF OTHER THAN PERSONS GOING ABOUT THEIR LEGIMITATE BUSINESS, SUCH AS SHIFT WORKERS, COMMON CRIMINALS. BRUTALITY WAS NOT UNUSUAL AS BELLICOSE DRUNKS OFTEN RESORTED THERE AS WELL AS BORED HOOLIGANS SUCH AS TEDDY BOYS. I DO NOT KNOW IF THERE WAS A CLOBBER FIELD BETWIXT TEDS 'n' MODS BUT IN THE OLD DAYS OF TEDS THERE WAS FIERCE AGRO. I MET A LOUT WHO TOLD ME FOR THE AGRO HE SEWED FISH HOOKS BEHIND HIS LAPELS. MAYBE HIS WINKLE PICKERS WERE ELECTRIFIED.

I WAS DISGUSTED, AS A CHILD BEING DILIGENTLY ESCORTED, AT THE STANDARD OF REPAST. BYWATERS PIES WERE AWFUL; LARD CAKED WITH STALE MEAT VAT BAKED. THE HOT BREWS WERE POOR THOUGH OF COURSE BOVRIL WILL CAKE ALMOST ANYTHING.

THE PROPRIETOR-PURVEYORS WERE ELDERFOLK WHO LIKELY KNEW THE OLDEN BULL RING.

THE RAILWAY STATION WAS AN ALTARPIECE OF VICTORIANA - AS ANYONE CAN READILY RECOGNIZE WITH EASE ON VIEWING THE THREAD AVAILABLE PICTURES OR VISITING THE PUBLIC LIBRARY.
A MARVELLOUS ITEM IT WAS DEMOLISHED BY CRANKS WHO SCAMMED THE CITY DURING THE 1960s and 1970s.

THE OLD WAGON, AS A MOBILE KITCHEN, WAS NOT UNIQUE. THERE WAS ONE OVER NEW STREET RAILWAY STATION WAY. UNFORTUNATELY INDUSTRIALIZATION INVOLVES BRUTALIZATION AND SO STANDARDS DETERIORATE. I DO NOT KNOW IF ALLEGED CORNISH PASTIES WERE AVAILABLE. IF THEY WERE I HOPE THEY WERE AN IMPROVEMENT ON WALLS AND BYWATERS SCOTCH EGGS. BUT SINCE SO MANY PEOPLE AS PATRONS WERE NOT RAILWAY PASSENGERS THEN I SUSPECT AFTER CLOSING TIME THE TASTE WAS NOT ALTOGETHER FABULOUS, THOUGH NATURALLY A BIG BREAK FROM FISH AND CHIPS. THIS WAS THE EMBRYONIC FAST FOOD CLIQUE. THEN THERE WERE A FEW ALL NIGHT CATERING OPERATIONS SUCH AS AT THE HOREFAIR, BROAD STREET - AS CAFES WHICH WERE OVERPRICED AND OF ATTROCIOUSLY POOR NOSH. ONE WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER ADVISED TO PACK A COUPLE OF SANDWICHES SUCH AS MALTO WITH THICK SPREAD OF CHEDDAR CHEESE AND MARMITE. THEN WORK UP AN APPETITE FOR A GULP OF BOVRIL.

THE SUNDAY MERCURY WAS A UNION NEWSPAPER JOB OWNED BY SOME
ASTOUNDINGLY REACTIONARY PEOPLE [AS BIRMINGHAM MAIL; THE SPORTS ARGUS; BIRMINGHAM GAZETTE] WHO AS A HIGH CABAL PLUNDERED THE CITY IN THE 1960S AND 1970S. PERSONALLY I ENJOYED THE SM WHEN IT WAS OK BEFORE THE RAKE OVER BY MOUNTEBANKS. SURELY THE STEELHOUSE LANE BUILDING IS A CONSCIOUSNESS SEARING LANDMARK TESTIMONY?

I ADROITLY SALUTE THE ENTREPRENERIAL DRIVE OF THOSE OVERNIGHT WAGONEERS. FISH AND CHIP SHOP OPERATORS ENDURED SIGNIFICANT ORDEAL AS THE COOKING OIL WAS OFTEN OVERUSED AND AS SUCH RANCID (A POWERFUL CARCINOGEN). ROYAL TALLOW IS A SCAVAGER OPERATION WHICH COLLECTS STALE COOKING OIL TO FORRAGE INTO SOAP. THE PROBLEM WITH INDUSTRIALIZATION IN TERMS OF BRUTALIZATION OF HUMAN NUTRITION IS THAT IT IS A PASS ALONG SO THAT CHEMICALIZATION OF THE FOOD CHAIN RESULTS IN NONSENSICALITY. I'VE ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA WHY THAT CONTRAPTION @ SNOW HILL [GWR] RAILWAY STATION COULD NOT HAVE KNOCKED OUT SOME SAVOURY FARE INSTEAD OF CHEAP WRAPS. MAYBE THE FAMILY DROVE BENTLEYS AND MERCEDES. JOB TRAINING FOR COMPROMISED PERSONS COULD HAVE EASILY BEEN DONE WITHOUT LET OR HINDRANCE. NO PROBLEM WITH A QUEUE ABOUT THE CORNER PAST THE OLD CONTEMPTIBLES ON A SLATE GREY LEADEN CHILL DAMP GUSTED EVENING AWAITING A SAVOURY PASTY AND INTELLIGENT JUG OF SOUP.
GRABBING THE SUNDAY MERCURY IS ANOTHER STORY: I SUGGEST IT WAS BETTER IN MONOCHROME. THE WRITING WAS SO MUCH BETTER.

SURELY THE WAGON COULD HAVE BEEN BETTER ILLUMINATED?

 

[Rod]

As it happens HMLD I liked Bywaters Cornish Pasties, but there's no accounting for taste when your a kid? The pies? I was a great fan of Fleur De Lys they were most likely full of anything? least of all a animal that had lived and walked in a field. Its hard to get a nice pie now, but you can at least still make a dozen or so for yourself with some bits of beef, a nice large onion, some pastry, and a sprinkling of salt and plenty of good pepper!!

 

[Jerry]

I remember when I was a kid and fleur de lys pies first came on the market. I loved the chicken and mushroom pies and I used to persuade our mum to part with the price of one every friday night.
Of course in those days the pies contained real chickenI
Anyone remember Alex's by Station Street?

 

[hmld]

I forgot FDL pies. Though much of a muchness as bland. The fillings were boiled to nutritional extinction. A darn shame all told. Lot of lard (drippings) and of course the salt craving consign. In olden days the Cornish tin mines were a big deal for the brute capitalists - now of course there is a Duke and Duchess of Cornwall. (I've often been asked how those people came by all that: titles of real property - and all I can reply is: theft.) The women dropped pasties down the shafts. They were wrapped in wash cloths (maybe old nappies) and were still warm when they landed. I do not know if any women fell into the shafts. This task they performed in high winds and lashing rain, ice, snow. The pasties were rich. I can recall vegetables not so long ago which were purveyed by local cultivators. They were succulently savoury even if over boiled. Frying, if done intelligently as WOK wise, is a quick job. The nutritional integrity of the item is retained. So it is entirely reasonable to surmise the Cornish pasties were marvellously robust and contained perhaps such as rabbit, hare, pig. They were very poor people, as an economic entity, so that they subsisted by expropriation. That is how those immense estates and "stately homes" got incarnate. The life expectancy of the miners was not great, though more so than their counterparts in coal mines and in Wales. Anyone who does not understand the immiseration of industrialization as a process is missing the point. All sensible persons are well aware of lousy hygiene. We know that prior to the Enclosure Movement the mass of rural dwellers were filthy peasants. Such does not mean they were stupid, dolts, muck encrusted idiocy. But they were filthy. Q E I was considered eccentrical by her peers as she took bath initially once annually thence twice. As ludicrous as such is it was norm. Their hair was gone because of parasites when they were teens and their teeth rotted. There are exhibits today of wood replacements for their rotted teeth. E I could afford comestibles, of which she was passionately fond. She also took a pint of ale with breakfast. I'm not suggesting that is idiot fool nonsense but they did not brush their teeth as well as not bathing properly. Anybody who thinks there was a water shortage is delusional. The first railway trains were steam, a mechanism which continued in stalwart operation into the 1960s! I staunch believe anyone of us would pause a moment and salute that phenomenon. What is so odious as to be beneath contempt is the racket the lords and masters operated over the masses of toiling people.

I quite agree with a correspondent, Rod ['BRUMMIEY'], that a sensibly alert person can concoct a decent pie. Haggis is a firm component, which if steeped with assorted beans steeped in baking soda overnight [this prevents flatulence - I don't know the biochemistry other than it prevents fermentation while the beans hydrate], made fast with raw garlic, chopped shallots, red onions, diced green and red cabbage, green pea mush, chopped celery, animal components of choice such as calf liver and this as a base slow cook stired thick, wrapped in blanched cabbage leaves layered with varietal cheese and ground nuts, rolled into a barley, wheat, oat pastry made in currants, raisins, sun dried tomatoes will assure a long day and/or night of trekking for those of the outward bound spirit. Sturdy limbs assured of the kinder.

That stuff pales by comparison. I used grab haggis from the basement of Rackhams and Lewis's when a starving student. I supplemented it with Soy sauce from Chinese merchants, garlic powder and of course kippers quick fried in a cast iron pan in raw triple pressed virgin olive oil. For those with a quasi exotic taste there was Major Gray's Chutney range. I was fond of the ginger which is a great stomach settler and appetizer, especially for the ticklish.

Like dressmaking as DIY one wonders how it is that people with a kitchen do not express themselves more with herbs and spices and a multifarious miscellanae of life giving fresh foods. Actually it is astounding. A lot of the pie ingredients were the dregs of meat processing. As tea fininings (known in the trade as dust). While children knew no better as a captive audience it is hardly a basis for complacency, albeit born of nostalgia. A V-B correspondent, also name ROD, gave over a recipe for dog bisquits. They can only be described as mouth watering. Actually it is small wonder his dogs became amorous of their feathered coinhabitants. Astonishing stuff. According to his recipe if girls and boys were fed of such the Blues and Aston V would have enjoyed successive championships. Alex's and such, whether mobile or fixed - irregardless of the availability The Sunday Mercury and Sports Argus train - was very poor sustenance.

I was once helter skelter in a tavern at lunchtime off Grays Inn Rd., alongside the Outer Temple. A Friday. A friend alongside me about to take exercise at tennis nearby. Two reasonably well remunerated younger women sat at one of those little wood top cast iron tables, plonking down a plate each of reconstituted (mash) potatos, baked (salt and sugarated) beans and a big dark fried sausage. They had what appeared a Bacardi and Coke apiece. Those women are horizontal average eight hours per circadian rhythm and sedentary in offices another 7-8; as well few walk to their work stations. Now what kind of a story is that? My friend glared at the platter array and murmured under his breath, "My God." He was a farmer and it was not remotely amusing. One actually felt sorry for them. That is known as living off their time inasmuch as, unless there is something highly unusual, month after month and year after year there is no way one can keep packing one's self with that dietetic regimen.

Fortunately when Snow Hill railways station [GWR] was full belt flouride had not been added to the water. But of course the taste of chlorine ruins and of course obliterates the immune defence system. I do not recall vomiting on imbibing a cheap plastic cup of instant coffee at those facilities but other than being hot I found the olfaction repugnant, except for Bovril which took over the taste of everything. Quite nice with a slice of lard fried bread, sometimes known as a dip. Of course one could always splash HP sauce on the item under the scornful eye of the proprietors. Talk about the trickle down effect of miserly! "Counting the halfpence with the pence / Turn prayer to shrivening prayer." People were better off before that racket. If they had cleaned up. During the time of Shakespeare - or whoever composed all that stuff - it was routine for a master craftsman to work only half of the year.
:wink:

 

[Anne Jessel]

Yum

Reading about all this food is giving me cravings. All I've got to offer as a post is a hot potato from the hot potato man outside Snowhill Station. It was delicious on a cold, frosty, smoggy, dark drizzly evening waiting for my bus home to West Brom.
Anne

 

[jake]

I remember when I was a kid and fleur de lys pies first came on the market. I loved the chicken and mushroom pies and I used to persuade our mum to part with the price of one every friday night.
Of course in those days the pies contained real chickenI
Anyone remember Alex's by Station Street?

yes ALEX the pie man, we used to go and get a steak and kidney pie most nights, they were fab, i can still taste them now, a lot of celebrities from the hippodrome used to buy a buy a pie from alex he was a legend,he had
a great following, he sold the first fleur de ly,s pies i think.

 

[Geoff]

Alex late night hot pie stall was a regular venue for revellers on a Saturday night where they would queue 20 deep for his steak and kidney or chicken and mushroom pies with chips. He bought the recipes from the lady licensee of the Fleur de Lis pub at Lowsonford which was a popular run out for a pie and a pint by the canal on fine summer evenings or weekends. Alex made so much money from his pies he opened a shop in, I think, Ethel Street. He later sold out to a pie manufacturer in Emscote Road, Warwick near the canal bridge. They were taken over and Alex's pies are now still available as Pukka Pies, served mainly in fish and chip shops and also in Morrisons.

 

[ethanedwards]

ALEX'S PIE STAND'S
(The Snackerie)

Snow Hill and Hill Street

..

The pie stand at Snow Hill,
Special thanks to Snoker for these photographs

The one at Hill Street

The Snackerie or "Alex's pie stand"
as it was more widely known,
were popular spots in Snow Hill,and Hill Street during the 1960s
for members of local bands
to get a hot meal after a late night engagement.

It was there where many group members met
and exchanged stories and ideas;
discussing future plans and catching up
on the latest music news.

Thanks to John of Brumbeat,
for the essence of this post.

Here's a piece I wrote for BBC Today

The whole scene in those days,
was known as the Birmingham group scene and lots of musos,
would meet after gigs, at such places
as the Cedar, Rum Runner, Opposite Lock, Rebecca’s
and after at Alex's Pie stand,
there was great camaraderie,
and I just hope the present musos have something similar!" -
writes Keith Law of 60s Brumbeat group 'Velvet Fogg'.

Although not a live music venue,
it was certainly a venue for live musicians!
I spent many an hour there with my friends,
at say 2 or 3 in the morning,
it was like a 'who's-Who' of Brum Beat

 

[dib44]

If I remember correctly there were a few posts relating to this awhile or so back...

This was one of them..

https://forum.birminghamhistory.co.uk/showthread.php?t=14101&highlight=Alex%27s+Pie+Stand

 

[The Baron]

It was also the spot for Skaters to meet up after a late night at Summerhill ice rink ,SNOW HILL STATION & ALEX PIE STAND brings back so many good memories of friends & times long gone.

 

[JohnO]

Another fascinating article! I am thoroughly enjoying all this nostalgia of the days when everything seemed possible!

 

[dek carr]

I remember it well opposite the Albany the last port of call before you went home. Wherever you had been that night it was a detour to Alex,s. Dek

 

[Stitcher]

dek carr, you beat me to it. I can not remember Alex's on Snow Hill. I worked on doors from the late fifties and had a m/cycle to get around, and I can only remember Alex's at the lower end of Hil Street, in fact the brick wall in the picture is/was the wall of The Crown on the corner of Stn St. I do recall a less popular tea hut on Snow Hill, facing the entrance I think. This is all from memory so may not be exact, but could the one on Snow Hill have been operated by the Council.

 

[dav19390]

Alex's Pie Stall was definitely situated outside the main entrance to Snow Hill Station in Colmore Row during the late 1950s and early 1960s. I was a frequent purchaser of his hot meat pies and a cup of steaming coffee on a cold winter night.
I can't now remember whether it was a trailer or a small, converted single-decker bus, but he would pull up with it about 10.00pm each night in the small layby that normally was used by taxis as a drop off point for station passengers. There was always a small group of people standing round outside the station, eating pies and hotdogs, until well into the small hours of the morning. I don't know what time he packed everything up and drove away but I seem to remember passing one morning about 2.00am and he was still serving then.

 

[Stitcher]

Alex's Pie Stand was also most certainly definately opposite the Albany on the lower end of Hill St. at the rear of The Crown, and that is where the photo was taken.

 

[ethanedwards]

Alex's Pie Stall was definitely situated outside the main entrance to Snow Hill Station in Colmore Row during the late 1950s and early 1960s. I was a frequent purchaser of his hot meat pies and a cup of steaming coffee on a cold winter night.
I can't now remember whether it was a trailer or a small, converted single-decker bus, but he would pull up with it about 10.00pm each night in the small layby that normally was used by taxis as a drop off point for station passengers. There was always a small group of people standing round outside the station, eating pies and hotdogs, until well into the small hours of the morning. I don't know what time he packed everything up and drove away but I seem to remember passing one morning about 2.00am and he was still serving then.

This correct, and I used it many, many times.
In fact it faced towards the station, and there was a lay by in front,
where we used to pull up in our band vans etc.

Is it possible there was two??

However the one profiled is the one at Snow Hill station

 

[snoker]

Stitcher.
you are quite right. The pie stand by the Albany was Alex Fleur de Lys. The stand in front of Snow Hill was not.
It was in the ownership of my wife's family throughout the 1950's and 1960's.

 

[ethanedwards]

Here's a quote from a fellow band member of Williams Conquerors

In 1965, the Brum Beat scene was seemingly the place to be and Williams Conquerors were excited to be part of it. Alex's pie stand at Snow Hill was a place to gather and chat after bookings.

I think probably, the one at Snow Hill was called 'The Snackerie'
but everyone, called it Alex's

 

[dek carr]

We appear to have a clash of locations hear if you click on the link in post "2" there is clearly a photo of Alexs on the car park opposite the Albany Hotel as i worked on the erection of this building (1961--62) i know that Alexs was there at that time . Dek

 

[ethanedwards]

We appear to have a clash of locations hear if you click on the link in post "2" there is clearly a photo of Alexs on the car park opposite the Albany Hotel as i worked on the erection of this building (1961--62) i know that Alexs was there at that time . Dek

I agree, there were clearly two Pie Stands,
so to clear things up, the one profiled is the one at Snow Hill

 

[ethanedwards]

I have also found this article written by Bev Bevan

Our favourite place to stop after gigs - no, make that the ONLY place to stop after gigs - was the legendary Alex's Pie Stand in Digbeth, near Birmingham's Albany Hotel.
That's where dozens of group vans would park up and we would all talk about which new songs we were going to learn, which new instruments were on our wish lists, what latest stage clothes we were going to buy and exchange phone numbers of girls we had picked up lately.
Most important, though, was the food. We were always starving hungry after a hard night's performing and travelling, and we couldn't wait to get stuck into those meat pies, hot dogs and that scalding hot tea.
At a Brum Rocks Live gig earlier this year, at a packed Solihull Arts Complex, compere Laurie Hornsby was explaining to an enraptured audience the culinary delights of Alex's Pie Stand.
"The best thing," he said, "was the steak and kidney pie - it had a soft bottom and a crusty top."
At this point some joker in the audience shouted out: "I had a bird like that once!"

So there were indeed TWO pie stand meeting places

 

[dek carr]

Eathanedwards problem solve4d. Dek

 

[Mossy]

Stitcher and Snokel are perfectly correct the photo Eathenedwards has got on here is definitely the one by the Albany the bottom end of hill street i can remember it as if it was yesterday,when i was a Mod we used to taunt the rockers on their motorbikes out side

And it did back onto the Station pub which was called ''Cutlers'' for the reason i don't know perhaps some one knows the answer

Mossy

 

[G G Jean]

Pete just took a look Mossy and agrees with you. He said it brings back good memories. Jean.

 

[Elizabeth Redmond]

Stitcher and Snokel are perfectly correct the photo Eathenedwards has got on here is definitely the one by the Albany the bottom end of hill street i can remember it as if it was yesterday,when i was a Mod we used to taunt the rockers on their motorbikes out side

And it did back onto the Station pub which was called ''Cutlers'' for the reason i don't know perhaps some one knows the answer

Mossy

Mossy i remember Alex's well but wasn't the pub the Crown and the Station pub at the other end of the street

 

[Elizabeth Redmond]

dek carr, you beat me to it. I can not remember Alex's on Snow Hill. I worked on doors from the late fifties and had a m/cycle to get around, and I can only remember Alex's at the lower end of Hil Street, in fact the brick wall in the picture is/was the wall of The Crown on the corner of Stn St. I do recall a less popular tea hut on Snow Hill, facing the entrance I think. This is all from memory so may not be exact, but could the one on Snow Hill have been operated by the Council.

I remember it on Hill St, and the pub was the Crown on the corner of Station St

 

[maggieuk]

I remember Alex's really well by Snow Hill ..looking back the pies were not that good.. just cant seem to remember anyone else open that late..Ps Mossy I was a rocker

 

[Mossy]

Elizabeth you got me thinking about the name of the pub and at the end of the road facing the bus station was a hotel with a bar on the bottom floor i think it was the Midland Hotel

And Maggie we threw some rocker birds into the fountain back of the town hall....was you one

Mau-reece