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Pork Pies

Pork pies are pastry-wrapped pork steaks served with white gravy, wine, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: White wine and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,776 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Pork Pies

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Make round shapes from pastry about the size of a small plate and 3 inches high.

  3. Trim the rind and excess fat from the pork, then cut into neat short steaks.

  4. Beat the pork steaks with a rolling pin and season with salt and pepper.

Assemble and bake

  1. Pack the seasoned pork tightly into the pastry shapes.

  2. Wet the edges of the pastry, place the top on, and pinch it closed.

  3. Make a small hole in the center of the crust.

  4. If serving hot, pour in white gravy mixed with a little white wine and vinegar before serving.

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. White wine + vinegartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,776 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Pepper + white winetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,433 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Pork + white winetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,544 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Pork loin or neck
Provides the meat filling, which stays moist and tender when cooked in the pastry.
White gravy
Adds moisture and savoury flavour to the pork when poured in before serving hot.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma to the gravy mixed in before serving.
Vinegar
Adds sharpness to the gravy, balancing the richness of the pork and fat.

The step that matters

Pack the seasoned pork tightly into the pastry shapes.. Tight packing leaves little air between pieces, so the filling holds its shape and the pie does not collapse or develop large gaps as the meat cooks and shrinks.

“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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