Pork Pie
A pork pie seasoned with egg yolks & herbs - contributed by Rebecca A. C. Smith
  • 1 1/4 lbs pork loin, boneless, trimmed of fat and thinly sliced
  • 2 egg yolks
  • 1/8 tsp each pepper, mace and ground cloves
  • 1/4 tsp each sage, thyme and ground nutmeg
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 3 tbsp butter diced
The original recipe called for about 2/3 of the meat to be pork loin and the remaining 1/3 veal. Good veal being something of great expense, I decided to just use all pork. Rabisha's recipe also specified a different seasoning blend for each meat. Following Ms. Lorwin's suggestion in her book, I divided the meat roughly into thirds, seasoning two thirds with the pork seasoning of pepper, sage, thyme and 1/2 of the salt, and seasoning the remaining third with the "veal" seasoning of mace, nutmeg, cloves and the rest of the salt. The respective seasoning blends are each mixed with an egg yolk and the meat stirred about in it until coated.

Pastry

  • 2 cups all pupose flour
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 3/4 cup margarine (as sub for butter)
  • 1/2 cup cold water
  • 1 egg, separated
Sift together flour and salt. Cut in margarine with pastry cutter. Stir in water and egg yolk with fork . When pastry has been rolled out and pie filled, glaze with beaten egg white. This is a two-crust pie that I made without the aid of a pie pan, but laid out on a cooking sheet. Atop the first crust is placed half of the pork-seasoned meat and 1/3 of the butter, then the "veal" followed by another 1/3 of the butter and the rest of the pork topped by the remaining butter and the top crust. The diced butter is used in place of the clarified butter with which Rabisha advised his readers to fill the pie after baking. This was for the purpose of preservation as pies were meant to last for a while.* That not being a problem here, I've followed Ms. Lorwin's lead in leaving that step out. Bake at 450° F for 20 minutes, then lower heat to 350° F and bake 25 minutes. For 1 table of 8 diners.

* Lorwin, p 201

Lorwin, Madge; Dining with William Shakespeare; Athenneum, New York, 1976, p. 332.

Pork Pie is featured in Feast for Christmas Revel

Metric, Celsius, & Gas Mark Equivalencies

Rebecca A. C. Smith is a tax collector for the State of Louisiana. She is an active member of the Society for Creative Anachronism, while her other hobby is Science Fiction and Sci-Fi Fandom.

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Pork Pie © 1997 Rebecca A. C. Smith | This page © 2000 James L. Matterer

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