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: