Crimpinology

Like I said, you don't have to achieve a perfect circle – the crimping hides all the imperfections – have a look :

Here's the pastry folded over the filling and pressed down

firmly into a semi circle – sort of!

To crimp is to compress into small folds. To become a competent crimper takes lots of practice – be brave and have a go!

Have the pasty in front of you as illustrated in the photo above. If you are right handed begin on the right – on the left if you are left handed. Fold the corner end of the pasty over, place your thumb into the fold – this will help give you an even crimp, fold the pastry edge over and over towards you and continue until you reach the other end, tuck the end underneath and press to seal. Complete by making a small incision in the top of the pasty to release the steam.

They look like this :

Crimped and ready to egg wash

Egg washed and ready for the oven

Nearly there!

Step by step pasty pastry photos

Flour your surface well, unwrap your

dough

Cut your dough into four equal pieces

Don't stress if you don't achieve a perfect circle

Layer your meat and/or veggies as you prefer in the centre of the pastry. Moisten one half of your circle with water.

It looks like this :

Now for the tricky bit – the crimping – what I call crimpinology!

The end is in sight!

Here's a photo of the veggie filling :

You know how I like to mess about and hopefully make – in this case a pasty – a bit different. I've added a mornay sauce to the veggies, a stiff mornay sauce, you don't want it leaking through your pastry.

If you're interested, here's the recipe :

Mornay Sauce

20g unsalted butter

20g plain flour

300ml of milk – I use semi skimmed

75g mature Cheddar cheese

(or a combination of Cheddar and gruyere)

salt and black pepper

¼ tsp Dijon mustard - optional

Melt the butter in a pan and stir in the flour. Cook gently for a minute, stirring – make sure you don't brown the mixture. Gradually add the milk whisking constantly and eventually bring to the boil, whisking until it's smooth and thick. Lower the heat and simmer for 2 minutes, then add the cheese, mustard and season. I'd taste before you add salt – there's salt in the cheese – adjust accordingly.

This recipe will give you 420g of sauce – add 2 heaped tablespoons to your veggies and fold through. Cover and fridge until required. You'll have 280g of sauce left – the world is your Cornish pasty – serve extra sauce warmed in a jug on the side or freeze it – ready to use with another dish on another day! A fish pie gets my vote.

Back to the pasty

Flour your pastry board. Cut your pastry into four equal pieces. Roll out one into a circle, flip your pastry and turn it as you go, re-flour if you need to. You want a circle of 8-9” (21-23cms). If you're not good at rolling pastry measure the diameter of either a bowl or a plate to the size given and use, upturned, to get a perfect circle.

Step by step pastry photos next.

The Cornish pasty recipes – the filling

The traditional filling – per pasty

50g/2oz onion

50g/2oz turnip or swede

100g/4oz beef skirt, blade or chuck steak

150g/6oz sliced potatoes

salt and black pepper

Make sure the meat is free of fat and cut into similar sized pieces ¼” (6mm) and ensure that the turnip and onion is too. Cut your potatoes into quarters and then finely slice. You can submerge the potatoes in a bowl of cold water until you're ready to mix your filling together – drain and pat dry. Slice the onion and turnip to a similar size.

You have two options, layer each of the ingredients and season as you go then complete with a layer of potato. Don't salt the last layer, you'll affect the taste of the pastry.

Alternatively place all your ingredients in a large mixing bowl, season and mix well, cover and set aside to rest whilst you're rolling out the pastry. This option allows the ingredients to absorb all the flavours.

That's the recipe for a pasty with meat, here's mine without :

Veggie Pasty filling

sufficient for two pasties

100g/4oz leek

100g/4oz onion

150g/6oz sliced potatoes

celery salt

black pepper

dried parsley

As with the previous recipe, ensure that the veggies are sliced to a similar size – ¼”/6mm. I used a new potato – the Gold, a Charlotte would be perfect too. The reason I used a new potato is that I wanted there to be evidence of the potato with the other veggies and not a mush. It's more appropriate with the meat and potato that an “old” variety of potato is used to combine with the meat and other ingredients. Mix the veggies together and season well.

More photos up next and the end is in sight!

The Cornish pasty – pastry photo guide

I've been careful to photograph each step for this iconic delicacy and rather than bombard you with heaps of photos at the end I'm giving you them in stages, which I think you'll find more helpful and less likely to make you want to throw in the towel and give up!

Hang in there, it's worth it.

your veggie alternative to lard

ready to rub in

 

it looks very strange!

now it looks like dough

 

ready to wrap

safely gathered in

the clean bowl speaks for itself

Now for the filling!

The Cornish pasty – the recipes

Here's the basic pastry recipe :

Pasty pastry

This recipe will give you four eight inch (21cms) pasties

450g/1lb strong white bread flour

large pinch of salt

100g/4oz of margarine

100g/4oz lard

175ml/3^rd pint water

cling film

Place the flour and salt into a large mixing bowl. Add 25g/1oz of lard and rub into the flour. Grate or slice the rest of the fats into the bowl and stir, using a round bladed knife. Pour all the water into the bowl and mix together with the knife. Keep the dough in the bowl and using your hand bring the dough together and knead using the heel of your hand. Tip the dough onto a sheet of cling film and use the film to bring the dough together in a fat circle. Wrap the dough twice in cling film, bag and fridge. Chill it for at least 30 minutes.

Before we go any further I can hear you exclaiming – LARD! - what is she thinking. You don't have to use lard, for me and other vegetarians out there, use either Trex or Cookeen – panic over! The lard is part of the original recipe. I used unsalted butter instead of the margarine.

For those who are used to making pastry, no matter how basic, this will seem an odd method. I promise you it works. Not only does it work I'd say it's the best result I've ever had.

For example, it doesn't matter if you fridge it to chill for 30 minutes and, surprise surprise, you get distracted and remember two hours later. It does not affect the end result.

A tip – as you can see the recipe gives you four pasties from the batch of pastry. When you're ready to roll (sorry!) cut the pastry into four equal portions. At this stage you can please yourself – make two pasties and then wrap the remaining two separately in cling film, bag and freeze for another day.

Take the frozen pastry out of the freezer the night before you want it and fridge it.

It behaves impeccably – just as if freshly made.

Next up, a pastry photo guide so far.

The Cornish Pasty – the golden rules

This series may seem a tad long winded but these culinary masterpieces should not be rushed!

The filling is always raw and is baked at the same time as the pastry. The pasty is a meal in itself and in Cornwall it's actually considered an insult to serve them with anything else.

The meat content should be diced, never minced. The beef should be either chuck steak or skirt – also known as blade. A pasty should contain 12.5% beef. The vegetables should be finely sliced of a similar size so they cook evenly and the potatoes should be an “old variety” which will “fall”. Use strong plain flour – the sort used in bread making. As you can see, this is not an expensive meal – at it's roots the pasty evolved from humble ingredients that were plentiful and nutritious. The meat element was the most costly which is probably why the percentage of meat is as small as it is.

Think of the pasty as a pressure cooker – you need to release steam – place a small hole in the top of the pasty. Don't be tempted to tuck into your pasty straight from the oven – trust me – the inside stays hot for a long time.

Pasties are usually personalised with initials – top left, others say top right – who knows! It does however date back I think to the miners when some owners provided large ovens at the surface to keep the pasties hot for the men. A useful tip for today if you're tweaking the filling to suit your family and friends' preferences!

You'll read all sorts of “do's and don'ts” about pasty pastry and to be fair, there's no right or wrong way, all I can tell you is what follows works.

Recipes up next!