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Baked Meat Pie

A baked pie with meat, gravy, and a pastry crust made from flour, suet, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Meat and pork are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,208 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Baked Meat Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Dredge the meat with flour and cover with boiling water.

  2. Simmer for 1 to 3 hours or fry in a covered saucepan with a slice of fat salt pork.

  3. Cut the meat into dice and place it in a deep baking dish.

  4. Fill the dish with gravy.

Make the crust

  1. In a bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, and salt.

  2. Chop in the suet.

  3. Mix in ice-cold water until a dough forms.

  4. Roll out the dough lightly.

Bake

  1. Place the dough on top of the meat and gravy.

  2. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 30 minutes.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Meat + porktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,208 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  2. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Meat + eggtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,432 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Pork + flourtop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Meat + flourtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,529 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Meat
Provides the savoury core of the filling, becoming tender through slow simmering or frying.
Flour
Thickens the gravy and gives the dough its structure.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the crust short and tender as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the dough so the crust rises and lightens in the oven.
Fat salt pork
Adds fat and savoury flavour to the meat as it cooks.

The step that matters

Keeping the crust dough cold and handled lightly. Ice-cold water and suet keep the fat solid until baking, so it melts and creates flaky layers. Overworking or warming the dough develops gluten and makes the crust tough rather than tender.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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