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Cornish pie is a traditional meat pie from Cornwall, England, usually containing steak, onions, and potatoes. It was originally made for miners and is now commonly found in British and Irish pubs, as well as in the US. The crust can vary, but the filling is typically hearty and filling. Similar dishes include empanadas and calzones.
Cornish pie (pronounce the first syllable like the word “paste”) is a meat pie or turnover that gets its name from its origins in Cornwall, England. It is usually made of a fragment, which is folded over and pinched together to form a semicircle or crescent shape. Traditionally the Cornish pie contains steak, onions and chopped potatoes, although there are dessert versions called turnovers which might contain fruit. From Cornwall comes the slang term for pasty, oggy, which can still be used in some parts of the UK to refer to this meat pie.
You might call a Cornish patty one of the original fast foods, since they were made to be carried by miners who would eat them as their only meal of the day. Today you will often find them in British pubs and, to some extent, in Irish pubs as well. You’ll also likely find them in the United States in British-inspired restaurants or pubs, and as a popular choice at Renaissance fairs and Scottish games. Freezer sections in UK grocery stores may contain chips in a variety of flavours, some including cheese, vegetarian and many meat selections. True Cornish pate, however, is almost always a combination of beef, onions and potatoes, with a little pepper for seasoning.
Depending on the recipe, Cornish pate can have a slightly dry taste. In pubs and restaurants, you may find them served topped with brown gravy to moisten the dish. The crust on the pastel also varies. Some are made with the most delicate puff pastry, even if it is not traditional, while others are made with simple dough. Early pies would not have featured a delicate crust, but rather quite thick, as Cornish pate often had to survive being transported, perhaps most of the day, in harsh conditions. Overburdening the crust could help drop a mess that gets dropped, and was presumably considered a good mess, so if you could drop it into a mine shaft and retrieve it intact.
That’s not to say that most messes would have been intentionally dropped. Indeed, the miners had small ovens in which all the pies brought to work could be stored and kept warm. Since it was usually the only meal the miners would have during backbreaking and long working hours, the mess had to be hearty and plentiful enough to withstand such harsh working conditions.
If you try a Cornish patty, you’ll notice that the traditional kind is quite filling, if a little dry unless drizzled with gravy, or as some prefer, ketchup. There are a number of meat pies in other cultures that are quite similar to the pasty. In particular, empanadas, while often containing spicier meat, are nearly identical in shape and size to Cornish pate. Another similar dish is calzone, although calzones are usually filled with cheese and salted meats and are more closely related to pizza.
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