Melton Mowbray Pie

The good thing about Melton Mowbray is not only that it sounds like a place in Leicestershire, it actually is a place in Leicestershire. It's also modifies the noun 'pie' to make a pie from said town that uses fresh rather than cured pork. The addition of eggs makes it a 'gala' pork pie and if the first thing you thought of was Dali's wife, you'll probably enjoy this.

Melton Mowbray pie has EU Protection of Desginated Orgin protection so this, technically, isn't that.

The model recipe I used is the V-Tol Veal Ham and Egg Pie Recipe, which was made by Gordon Bedson, who also designed aircraft and the Mackson. Anyone like to drive a car built by Nigella Lawson? Didn't think so.

The recipe isn't hard but it does require doing several different things correctly. They are - making a hot water paste, boiling some meat, boiling eggs and making a jelly. The V-tol recipe explains the technical details well.

As I was using fresh pork (a bit of fillet) rather than ham, to bump up the flavour I marinated it for a few hours in white wine and a mix of bay leaf, thyme, parsley, rosemary, juniper berries and peppercorns.

The pork went into a saucepan with the marinade and herbs along with a small rack of veal and a pig's trotter. It was then filled with water to cover and simmered for 30 minutes - skimming as necessary. I kept the veal bones and the pig's trotter in there to make a heartier stock and boost the natural gelatine and simmer for another 30 minutes before filtering in a seive with some paper towel in it and reducing to just two cups.

By this stage you should have a pile of cubed pork and veal. Allow it to cool.

Take the reduced stock and add a leaf of gelatine that you've dissolved in a little heted sherry and white wine (actually it might have been calvados and white wine but I can't remember).

Make the hot paste. It's actually very similar to a choux pastry but with lard instead of butter and no eggs in it. The boiling water/lard combo smells but kneading the warm fluid dough to smoothness is surprisingly relaxing. Roll out and line a greased springform pan with it - reserving some dough for the top of the pie.

Boil the eggs - 10 minutes in boiling salted water and cool them under cold running water to stop the cooking.

So... a covering layer of meat, then encirlce the eggs around the middle and fill with meat. Place pastry on top, seal the edges with a back of a spoon. Decorate suitably with the excess pastry and brush with an egg wash. It's important to make a couple of breathing holes. Put a foil trumpet in them to allow steam to escape while cooking. These holes become useful later.

Place it all in a 200C oven for 80 minutes - just keep an eye on it to make sure the pastry doesn't burn.

Now you just need to pour the stock into the pie via the breathing holes. It'll take a couple of goes as it settles. Leave the pie in the fridge to cool and then serve as part of a low maintenance all meat cold buffet as illustrated below.