4TH DECEMBER 2017
This post is one day late, but we now have good internet access.
Now having tried one for lunch today I am bound to expand on my mention of the pork pies sold at Ye Olde Pork Pie Shoppe featured on 2nd, posted yesterday.
Walker’s are one of the best pork pies we know. It is therefore interesting that, in addition to their own Dickinson & Morris pies, the shop stocks those.
The proprietors’ own produce comes in two different wrappers. The red one appears standard.
Jackie bought a more expensive white wrapped pie.
We consider ourselves connoisseurs of this traditional English delicacy which can vary enormously in quality. There were a number of different varieties on offer in Newark when we lived there. We would rate them out of 10, taking into account both the filling which must be firm and not fatty, and the pastry which must be crusty and not soggy.
Until today we had not found a Perfect Ten. We have now.
Dickinson & Morris provide the following information on their website:
‘The business was founded by John Dickinson in 1851. In 1886 Joseph Morris joined the business as an apprentice and in 1901 the company changed its name to Dickinson & Morris.
Our bakery and retail outlet, Ye Olde Pork Pie Shoppe, is a tourist destination and key landmark in both Melton Mowbray and the UK as a whole. In March 1992, after fire had devastated the period style building, Samworth Brothers bought the property and carried out extensive refurbishment and renovation in conjunction with English Heritage.
Ye Olde Pork Pie Shoppe reopened in October of that year. Next door to Ye Olde Pork Pie Shoppe, The Sausage Shop now offers a selection of up to 20 different sausage varieties.’
James Peacock visited this afternoon, bringing back my restored iMac computer, and setting us up with EE mobile broadband. For me, this latter process was mystifying, fascinating, and conducive to reminiscence.
The mystification concerned all the clicks on the screen, too fast for me to follow. The fascination was about the mobile phone masts that James could plot on the maps he had accessed. There are three in New Milton within the range of the EE receiver. It was news to me that we could access the internet without broadband cables which are not a great deal of use in our location.
It was wandering around the house seeking a location for the best signal that evoked the reminiscence. James is too young to have remembered the hours of taking it in turns to stand holding an aerial in the early days of television. It was some years before the first sets could be operated without the use of a cumbersome external area. This was meant to stand on top of the old black and white apparatus. In reality it would only pick up a half-way useful signal in the most awkward corner of the room whilst being clutched in hands attached to outstretched arms.
This evening I dined on Jackie’s excellent chili con carne and egg fried rice, while she chose a pasta bake. With mine I drank Mendoza malbec 2016
I’ve never tried chili con carne with egg fried rice – separately and with different dishes, yes: but never combined; I should give it a go. I shall also keep my eyes peeled for a Dickinson & Morris pork pie. As you say, these things can vary enormously, from fatty lumps of gristle in a specially baked plywood case, to almost mouth-watering perfection. Should any of your readers ever venture to the frozen north of England, I can happily recommend an apple-topped individual pork pie sold by the supermarket chain, Booths (currently rumoured to be up for sale, sadly) on their deli counter; yum!!
Many thanks, Mike. Sainsbury’s and Waitrose stock D & M, but the red wrapped ones are not as good as the white
I remember well standing on a stool and then on tiptoe to find the best spot for the internal tv aerial. The worst of it was then being told to stay there in that position so that the programme could be watched by the family! A most interesting post, Derrick.
Many thanks, Roland. I was amused that our 21st century expert didn’t know about this 🙂
I have found that with my new mobile modem it seems to work better if I stand with my left foot in a bucket of warm porridge and rub my tummy anticlockwise. I don’t make spealling mistake then either.
Most encuriging, Pool, Thanks very much
Thanks you, Reporter
A couple after my own heart Derrick.. and Hubby just loves a good Pork Pie.. 🙂 Happy your mobile and internet is now working I may have missed a few updates while I have been on holiday..
Enjoy your EE connections..
And wishing you a most excellent week to both of you xx 🙂
Many thanks, Sue. Good wishes reciprocated
🙂
From pork pies to computers to TV antennas. You’ve covered a lot of territory. Franco Americans and French Canadians make a pork pie called Tourtiere. It’s made with ground pork, spices, onions, and potatoes. Delicious but heavy. I’m afraid my aging stomach can’t take them any longer. 😉
Bad luck re the pies, Laurie. Many thanks
After reading about pies. I am going to bake some this weekend 😀
Enjoy them, Rupali. Many thanks
The pot pie and history of the building is lovely. So glad you found a 10!
Many thanks, Lynn
Most welcome derrick!
There nothing like a wonderful traditionally made meat pie, scrumptious is the word !! In Geelong we have great pies made by Routley’s Bakery…..
Pork Pie…does it use roast pork, or a variety of sausages ? Just curious.
Minced up raw pork, baked in its pastry case, Van. Thanks for asking 🙂
We enjoy pork pies in this household too, though I have to limit my intake to a tiny sliver nowadays! Pleased to know you have your iMac back.
Many thanks, Clare
Though I don’t eat meat, the pies look delicious. I’m glad you discovered a perfect 10!
Also, you must be pleased to have your Internet connection fixed. Did you not have WIFI before?
It wasn’t so long ago that we had the “rabbit ears” for our TVs! 🙂
We had 2 different internet providers. Simultaneously. Both very unreliable with Hubs. The mobile system is a new one to me, and, so far, works better. Thanks very much, Merril
Ooh! I’ve just been commenting on a pie post on one of Hey Jude’s sites, and find myself moving directly through to a 10/10 pork pie post. Could it be some kind of astral message? If I come across another post directly after this, I’m going directly to Pie in real life (as they might have said in Monopoly but didn’t).
🙂 Many thanks, Susan
It’s amazing how far technology has come in such a, relatively, short time. I remember our first little black and white TV that came in a honking great cabinet and you had to wait for it to warm up … same with the radio.
I wonder what sort of technology the children of today and tomorrow will have to compare their reminiscences to?
Many thanks, Widders. That is, indeed, something I also speculate about
I also wonder where technology is going, and what people will do with it. Rick noted drones for sale at a local shop recently. I’ve already had one spy on me in the garden 2 years ago. I am not sure where it came from.
Yes
A very good read today. I really must someday have one of those pork pies! Love meat pies!
We used to have a 15 feet tall TV antenna, the largest in the vicinity (before a jealous neighbour fixed a 20 feet tall mast atop his roof) which we would keep adjusting forever to receive better signals. I am happy you can work without the tangle of cables although it is not without the times that leave me worrying if the preponderance of signals aren’t frying up our brains and retarding the evolution of homo sapiens sapiens.
Many thanks, Uma. As a species, we are pretty well fried, it seems
Looks and sounds so yummy!!! 🙂 <3
Thanks very much, Natalie
You’re most welcome Derrick❣️?
Pork pie heaven of a piece … there is none finer 🙂
🙂 Many thanks, Osyth
Enjoyed that post Derrick, we have a suburb here in Tasmania called Melton Mowbray, think it was named due to the amount of English people who emigrated here after the second World War, they always speak of Pork Pies with fond memory’s.
Thanks a lot, Ian. Two of my uncles emigrated to Adelaide at that time
Back in the late 1960s. 68 or 69 when I was working in a country hotel in Narrogin, Western Australia, the publican decided that he’d serve English Pork Pies to his customers at lunch time.
They were imported (must have come over by sea, frozen) from England.
Anyway, the first day was a disaster, I wasn’t around, my day off, the second day was also a disaster until I explained to the boss that an English Pork Pie is served cold.
He was heating them in an oven and all the juice/gravy/jelly whatever just melted and ran out.
The customers didn’t like them for some reason and when I’d explained to them that they are eaten cold they carried on about “only silly bloody Poms would eat a cold pie”
They disappeared from the menu.
The War Office and my children think I’m rather odd for preferring a cold meat pie
What a disaster indeed, Brian. I had the reverse one in France with chitterlings. I thought they should be served cold. Yuck. Thanks a lot
They served warmed pork pies in West Yorkshire. I’ve had them at Rugby matches with Yorkshire caviare (mushy peas). But they aren’t proper Melton pies.
During my short-lived pie blog I was surprised to find it was possible to eat too many pies, something I had never considered before. 🙂
Thanks very much, Quercus