Recipe Advent Calendar - Day 12 and 13 - Cornish Pasties

Weird.  I didn't realize until just now that I'd never posted anything yesterday.  I'd given Bob my cookbook so he could make rolls for our Christmas party yesterday (and yes, that man can cook!) :) and never took it back, so it didn't even occur to me that I'd missed it.

So... I wanted to post something good for the weekend days.  Cornish Pasties are one of my favorite things from when we lived in England.  For those of you who have never been to England, these are not pronounced PASTRIES.  You say it like Fast, or Nasty, I suppose.  Pasty.  Not like made of paste, either.  That's a completely different thing!

Pasties are meat pies with a shortcrust pastry on the outside and they are filled with all kinds of yummy fillings and you hold them in your hand while you eat them.  My favorite is the actual Cornish type with potato, onion and steak, so that's what I'm posting here, but you can fill them with most anything savory.

Originally, pasties were from Cornwall in southern England.  The miners would take them for their lunches and they had a savory filling in one side and a sweet filling in the other side.  The edges were crimped with a rolled edge and since the miners had arsenic on their hands from the mine, they would hold this edge while they ate the pie, then they would throw out the edge for the ghosts (or knockers) that they believed were in the mines.

If you're lucky enough to live in parts of Arizona or in Las Vegas, Nevada, you can even go to the Cornish Pasty Company here in the states.  There are probably others, but that's the one I know about. Enjoy! (And watch out for the knockers! )

Cornish Pasties

Shortcrust pastry:
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 Tbsp sugar
6 Tbsp butter
2 Tbsp solid shortening
3 Tbsp cold water

Filling:
1 cup (8 oz.) finely sliced potato (sometimes I cut it into small cubes but that's not traditional)
1 cup (8 oz.) finely sliced onion and/or turnip
1 cup (8 oz.) sliced or cubed beef steak or chuck roast
salt and pepper
1 egg, beaten

Blend flour, sugar, and salt.  Cut With a pastry blender or two knives, cut in the butter and shortening into the flour mixture until the mixture is the size of small peas.  Gradually sprinkle water over the mixture, blending well with a fork.  Roll pastry into a ball, wrap it in plastic wrap or waxed paper and chill for one hour.  Roll out the pastry and divide it into two large or four small rounds.  Pile sliced veggies on one half of each pastry, but leave an open edge all the way around. Top with small pieces of beef.  Season with salt and pepper.  Place a few potato pieces on top of the beef to keep it from drying out.  Dampen the edges of the pastry with water and fold the open side over the side with the filling, to make a half-circle.  Crimp the edges of the pastry, like a pie crust, or even pressing down with a fork, although that's not the traditional way.  Make a small slit in the top of the crust to allow steam to escape and brush the tops and edges with beaten egg.  Place on greased cookie sheet and bake at 425 degrees for 10-15 minutes.  Then reduce heat and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes more.

Recipe Advent Calendar - Day 9 - Potato Salad and life lessons. :)

To finish up Salads, I guess I should probably add Potato Salad, the way the Blands make it.  LOL  The Stull family peels their potatoes and cuts them into cubes first, but I think it's a little mushy that way.  I like my potatoes to have a shape in potato salad, but not be too hard.  Bob likes them the mushy way and I like them not mushy - it's a fine line and means that we each need to compromise sometimes.  I switch back and forth on how I've made it, to accommodate each of us.  I've even gone so far as to cook half of the potatoes whole with skins on, like I like it, and half of them peeled and cut up, like Bob likes it.  LOL  The things you do to make a happy marriage!

It's sort of like when we got married, I liked Crunchy Skippy peanut butter and Bob liked Smooth Jif. We bought small jars of each.  I realized I liked Smooth Jif and Bob decided he liked Crunchy Jif instead.  So now we buy two kinds of Jif.  Ha!  Hey, if you can keep a marriage happy by buying two kinds of peanut butter, that seems like a win to me.

So, here's the Potato Salad recipe basically as I wrote it in our family cookbook.  But remember, potato salad is a personal choice and make it however you like it.  Some of the amounts change with the day, some change with how I'm feeling that day, or whose birthday it is, or whatever.  Experiment and make your potato salad how you like it!  And PLEASE, if you're taking it to a picnic, serve it chilled, on ice, or keep it in the cooler.  My pet peeve is salad with mayonnaise, sitting out in the sun waiting to poison everyone!!  

Potato Salad - the way the Blands make it.

4 baking potatoes, cooked whole in boiling water, until fork tender (if you score the skin around the middle of the potato with a knife before boiling, the skins just about slip off after they are boiled)
4 eggs, hard boiled (low boil for 12 minutes)
1/2 to 1 cup mayonnaise
2 tsp mustard
8 sweet gherkin pickles
a little pickle juice
2 tsp salt
pepper

After potatoes are boiled, take out of the water and allow to cool a bit until you can handle them.  Slip off the skins and cut potatoes into approx 1/2 inch cubes.  Place potato in a large bowl.  Peel eggs and cut up.  I like them in slices, Bob likes them cubed.  Experiment and decide what your own favorite is.  Add mayonnaise until creamy.  This will vary depending upon the type of potatoes, how you cooked them, the weather... who knows.  I use two really large heaping spoonfuls and adjust from there.  Add a heaping teaspoon - or two big squirts - of mustard.  (I'm really technical about my recipes, as you can see.)  Cut up several small sweet pickles.  I cut them in half, then in slices, but do what makes you happy.  Six or eight ought to do it.  Pour in a little of the pickle juice - a teaspoon or two maybe?  Add salt until it tastes right.  I always have to add more, so I'm guessing 2 tsp.  Add pepper if you like it.  I do.  Chill in the refrigerator.

There you go, potato salad and life lessons.  Be happy and compromise when needed.  :)