Cornish Pasties

evelyn/athens's Note:

We could buy these at a local bakery where I was growing up. I loved them and would often detour by the bakery after school to get one.

• Total Time: 1 hrs 20 mins
• Prep Time: 30 mins
• Cook Time: 50 mins

Ingredients:

Yield: 10 pasties

Short Crust Pastry

• 4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 cup vegetable shortening
• 6 tablespoons ice water (or more)
• 1 teaspoon salt

Filling

• 8 ounces lean ground beef
• 6 ounces boiling potatoes , peeled and cut into 1/2 inch dice
• 1 medium onion , finely chopped
• 4 -5 tablespoons beef gravy or 4 -5 tablespoons beef stock
• 1 teaspoon dried herbs (thyme, marjoram, sage)
• salt and pepper
• milk

Directions:

1. Combine ½ cup flour, shortening, 6 tbsp ice water and salt in large bowl and beat well with large whisk or wooden spoon.
2. Using fingertips, blend in remaining flour until mixture resembles coarse meal.
3. If too dry, add up to 2 tbsp more ice water, a few drops at a time.
4. Gather dough into ball.
5. Refrigerate at least 1 hour.
6. Combine beef, potatoes, onion and herbs and season generously with salt and pepper.
7. Stir in enough beef gravy to bind mixture.
8. Roll dough out on lightly floured surface to thickness of 1/8 of an inch.
9. Using 5-6 inch in diameter, round cutter, cut 10 circles.
10. Preheat oven to 400°F.
11. Lightly grease baking sheet.
12. Mound meat mixture lightly in center of each circle; brush border with milk; fold dough in half over filling, pinching edges together to seal.
13. Brush pastries with milk.
14. Arrange on prepared sheet.
15. Bake 10 minutes, reduce oven temperature to 340F and continue baking until pasties are light brown, about 45-50 minutes.
16. Serve hot or at room temperature.

Reviews

[Donna Sowerby]

My husband is English and loves pasties, which are hard to come by in Oklahoma! I made this using premade pie crusts, and doubled the filling ingredients. I split four premade crusts in half and made eight pasties. They were terrific!

[lilyson]

Using raw filling as opposed to pre-cooked really did make a difference; the pasties were much juicier than I've had. However, I found the filling itself fairly bland. I added some Worcestershire sauce beforehand, but no dice. I do plan on making this again to tweak the original recipe- for example, maybe with the addition of fresh herbs and garlic instead of dried, or perhaps even a crushed beef bouillon cube.

[Cookgirl]

It never would have occurred to me to toss the ingredients together raw. Most of the pasties' recipes I've come across indicate to cook the meat first then stuff. That doesn't always work for me. Although this is simple to make, it is rather time consuming especially with a toddler in tow demanding this and that. We're dreaming of these with variations: "cheese burger" style with Tillamoook cheddar cheese, Greek style with lamb and oregano, etc...One small turnip was added because it seems to be the tradition. I used a food processor to mince the onion and turnip, too and made sure the potatoes were diced small enough in order to cook all the way through. Fresh herbs form the garden: parsley, purple sage, thyme, French tarragon. Accompanied by Strawberry Salad W/ Poppy Seed Dressing. Recipe yielded sixteen pasties. Reviewed for ZWT 6.