Pork Pie, Properly Made

Ingredients

• 600g pork shoulder, minced coarse
• 200g pork belly, finely diced
• 1.5 tsp fine sea salt
• 2 tsp coarsely ground black pepper
• 1/2 tsp ground allspice
• 1/4 tsp ground mace
• 1/4 tsp ground white pepper
• 1 tbsp fresh sage, finely chopped
• 2 tbsp cold water
• 450g plain flour
• 1 tsp fine sea salt
• 150g lard, cubed
• 50g unsalted butter, cubed
• 175ml water
• 1 egg yolk, beaten with 1 tsp water (for glazing)
• 500ml strong pork stock (from trotters or hocks)
• 3 leaves gelatine (or 6g powdered, if stock isn't naturally setting)
• 1 bay leaf
• 6 black peppercorns

Method

1. Make the filling first so the seasoning has time to mingle while you wrestle with the pastry. Combine the minced shoulder, diced belly, fine salt, black pepper, allspice, mace, white pepper, sage and cold water in a bowl. Don't be shy with the salt here — this is the only seasoning the meat will get, and it needs to carry through a long bake and a long chill. Mix with your hands for a full minute until the filling turns tacky and binds against your palm; that bind is what gives the slice its clean, sausage-like cut. Cover and chill while you make the pastry.
2. Sift the flour and salt into a large bowl and make a well in the centre. Put the lard, butter and water in a small saucepan and bring to a proper rolling boil — the fat must be fully melted and the liquid genuinely bubbling, not just steaming. Underheated fat-water means a dough that cracks instead of moulds.
3. Pour the boiling fat-water straight into the well and mix quickly with a wooden spoon until it pulls together into a rough, shaggy dough. Tip onto the work surface and knead for 30 seconds until smooth and elastic. It will be hot and greasy in your hands — that's exactly right. Hot water crust is worked warm because the molten fat is what makes it pliable; let it cool and you've lost your window.
4. Cut off a third of the dough for the lid, wrap it tightly and park it somewhere warm — next to the hob is fine. If this lid pastry drops to room temperature it will crack the moment you try to roll it.
5. Flour the outside of an upturned 1-litre jam jar or a raised pie mould. Roll the larger piece of dough into a thick disc and drape it over the jar. Working quickly while the dough is still warm and supple, press it down the sides with your hands until you have a case roughly 14cm across and 8cm deep, with walls 7–8mm thick all the way round. Run your fingers up and down checking for thin patches — thin patches leak, and a leaked pie is a sad pie.
6. Chill the moulded case, still on the jar, for 20 minutes until firm to the touch, then carefully twist and lift the jar out. Stand the case on a baking tray lined with greaseproof.
7. Preheat the oven to 180°C fan. Pack the pork filling into the case, pressing firmly into the corners and mounding it a good 1cm above the rim — the meat shrinks as it cooks and you don't want a hollow cavern under the lid.
8. Roll the reserved lid pastry into a 15cm disc. Brush the rim of the case with egg yolk, lay the lid on top, and crimp the edges together with your thumbs in proper pinched pleats — not a fork-press, this isn't a Cornish pasty. Cut a 1cm hole dead centre for the steam to escape and the stock to go in later. Brush the whole pie generously with egg yolk for that deep mahogany finish.
9. Bake for 30 minutes at 180°C fan, then drop to 160°C fan and bake for a further 1 hour 15 minutes. You're looking for deep mahogany brown all over — pale gold means underdone and soggy on the base. If the top is racing ahead in the first 30 minutes, drape a sheet of foil loosely over it.
10. While the pie bakes, sort the jelly. Warm the pork stock gently with the bay leaf and peppercorns. Soak the gelatine leaves in cold water for 5 minutes until floppy, squeeze them out, and stir into the warm — not boiling — stock until completely dissolved. Boiling kills the set. Strain, taste and adjust the salt now: the jelly should taste a touch saltier than you'd want a soup, because it's seasoning the meat from the inside. Cool to barely warm and pourable. Test the set by chilling a teaspoon on a saucer for a few minutes; if it doesn't wobble like proper jelly, soften and stir in another leaf.
11. When the pie comes out, leave it on the tray for 30 minutes to settle and stop steaming. Using a small funnel or a piping bag with the tip snipped, pour the cool stock slowly through the hole in the lid. Go in stages — pour, pause, let it seep down through the meat, pour again. Stop when it threatens to overflow. This is the stock filling every gap the shrinking meat has left behind, and it's what defines a proper pork pie when you cut into it tomorrow.
12. Cool to room temperature, then refrigerate for at least 8 hours, ideally overnight. The jelly must set fully and the flavours need that long rest to come together — a pork pie eaten warm is just a meat pasty. To serve, take the pie out of the fridge 20 minutes before slicing so the jelly softens and the pastry fat tastes buttery, not waxy. Slice into wedges with a serrated knife and lay them out on a board with a pot of fierce English mustard, a spoonful of Branston or piccalilli, cornichons and pickled onions in a little dish, and a handful of watercress alongside.