Melton Mowbray Pork Pie

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •18cm loose-bottomed cake tin or springform tin
• •Heavy sharp knife and sturdy chopping board
• •Small funnel or jug with a good pouring lip
• •Rolling pin

Instructions

1. 1

   Prepare the filling

   This is the part that matters most. Take the pork shoulder and chop it by hand with a sharp, heavy knife. Not mince. Not a food processor. You want rough, irregular pieces, some the size of a pea, some a little larger. The unevenness is the point: it gives the pie texture and bite, something to press your teeth against. Season the chopped pork with the salt, white pepper, mace, and the anchovy essence if you're using it. Mix it well with your hands until the seasoning is evenly worked through. Cover and put it in the fridge while you deal with the pastry.

   The anchovy essence sounds odd but it's traditional. It doesn't make the pie taste of fish. It deepens the savouriness of the pork the way anchovies do in a slow-cooked lamb shoulder. A quiet presence, not a flavour.
2. 2

   Make the hot water crust

   Put the flour and salt in a large bowl and make a well in the centre. In a small saucepan, heat the water and lard together until the lard has melted completely and the liquid is just boiling. Pour it into the flour all at once and stir quickly with a wooden spoon until it comes together into a rough, shaggy dough. Turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead briefly until smooth. The dough should feel warm and pliable, like clay. Work quickly. Hot water crust is your friend while it's warm and your enemy once it cools and stiffens.

   If the dough cracks or turns stubborn, wrap it in a tea towel and set it near the warm oven for five minutes. It needs heat to stay cooperative. This is not shortcrust. Different pastry, different rules.
3. 3

   Raise and shape the pie

   Grease an 18cm loose-bottomed cake tin or springform tin with a little lard. Cut off roughly a third of the warm pastry and keep it under a tea towel for the lid. Roll the larger piece into a thick circle, about 30cm across, and drape it into the tin, pressing it firmly into the base and up the sides with your knuckles. Let it come a centimetre or so above the rim. There should be no gaps, no thin patches, no light showing through. If you want to do it the traditional way, raise it by hand around a floured jam jar and ease the jar out once the pastry holds its shape. The tin is more forgiving and the pie will taste the same.

   A hand-raised pie without a tin will bow outwards during baking. This is correct and desirable. It is the traditional Melton Mowbray shape, wider in the middle than at the top, and it is the sign that someone made this at home.
4. 4

   Fill and seal the pie

   Pack the seasoned pork into the pastry case, pressing it down firmly with your fist so there are no air pockets. Mound it slightly higher in the centre. The meat will shrink as it cooks, and the gap that opens between filling and crust is where the jelly will go. Roll the reserved pastry into a circle just larger than the top of the pie. Brush the pastry rim with a little of the beaten egg, press the lid on firmly, and crimp the edges together with your fingers or the back of a fork. Cut a clean hole in the centre of the lid, about the width of your little finger. This is not decoration. You will pour the jelly through it tomorrow.

   Keep the steam hole open during baking. If it tries to seal over, poke it clear as soon as the pie comes out of the oven. A small piping nozzle or a rolled tube of foil pushed into the hole during baking will hold it open.
5. 5

   Glaze and bake

   Heat the oven to 200C (180C fan). Brush the top and sides of the pie generously with the beaten egg yolk. Set the pie on a baking tray in case it leaks and bake at the higher temperature for thirty minutes, until the pastry starts to colour and feels firm to the touch. Reduce the oven to 160C (140C fan) and bake for a further hour and a quarter to an hour and a half. The pie is ready when the crust is a deep, confident gold all over. If the top colours too quickly, lay a sheet of foil loosely over it. If you're using a loose-bottomed tin, remove the sides for the last twenty minutes and brush the exposed pastry with more egg wash. A pale-sided pie is a half-finished pie.

6. 6

   Make and pour the jelly

   While the pie bakes, gently warm the pork stock. Soak the gelatine leaves in cold water for five minutes until soft and floppy, squeeze out the excess water, and stir them into the warm stock until completely dissolved. Let this cool to room temperature. It should be liquid but not hot. When the pie comes out of the oven, let it cool for thirty minutes or so, then slowly pour the jellied stock through the steam hole using a small funnel or a jug with a steady lip. Go slowly. Let it seep down through the gaps between meat and crust. You will need to come back to it two or three times as the liquid finds its level and the air pockets give way. Use as much as the pie will take.

   If you've made stock from pork bones and a trotter and it sets to a solid jelly in the fridge, skip the gelatine entirely. Just warm the jellied stock until it liquefies and pour it in. This is the better way, and it tastes like something the gelatine version only approximates.
7. 7

   Set overnight and serve

   Let the pie cool completely at room temperature, then cover it loosely and refrigerate overnight. The jelly will set firm. The flavours will deepen and settle. The pastry will absorb just enough moisture from the filling to become something remarkable: sturdy enough to hold in your hand, yielding enough to crumble when you bite through it. Serve cold, cut into generous wedges, with English mustard and perhaps some piccalilli if the mood takes you. This is picnic food. Boxing Day food. The sort of thing you wrap in greaseproof paper and carry in a bag to somewhere worth sitting. It doesn't need warming. It doesn't need improving. It needs a sharp knife, a steady hand, and someone to share it with.

Chef Tips

• •The pork must be chopped by hand. A food processor turns it to paste and you lose the texture that makes a Melton Mowbray worth making at home. A heavy knife, a solid board, ten minutes of honest work. The irregular pieces give each bite something to discover.
• •Ask your butcher for pork bones or a trotter when you buy the shoulder. Simmer them with an onion, a carrot, a bay leaf, and a few peppercorns for three or four hours, then strain and reduce by half. Chill it overnight. If it sets to a firm, wobbly jelly in the fridge, you have your pie jelly and it will taste better than anything leaf gelatine alone can manage.
• •Don't serve this warm. I know the temptation. But a pork pie eaten warm is a different, lesser thing. It needs the cold. The jelly needs to be set, the pastry needs to be firm, the flavours need the night in the fridge to find each other. Patience is the last ingredient and the most important one.
• •A whole pork pie keeps in the fridge for five or six days, wrapped loosely in greaseproof paper. It improves on the second day as the jelly firms and the seasoning deepens. By the third day it is at its quiet peak. After that, it's still good. Just less remarkable.

Advance Preparation

• •The pork stock should be made a day or two ahead and chilled. If it sets to a solid jelly in the fridge, it is ready and the leaf gelatine can be left out entirely.
• •The filling can be prepared and seasoned up to a day ahead, covered and kept refrigerated.
• •The finished pie must set overnight before cutting. This is not optional. Plan accordingly: make it on Christmas Eve, eat it on Boxing Day, and know that the waiting is part of the recipe.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 200g)