to wonder when a pie sudddenly became a casserole with a lid?! ... where's the rest of the pastry?

[Fairylea]

Yes. I am bored.

But seriously I've had several pies in pubs recently and they have all just effectively been a pie filling with a lid of pastry.... where's the pastry round the sides and bottom ?

I just watched them making a pie on daybreak and..... they did the same thing !

I'm outraged.

When did this become acceptable?

I don't like it.

Yanbu - its not a pie unless its encased in pastry. Any other way is a casserole with a lid.

I agree. Half a job, I call it!

YANBU, I recently had a pie out where the pastry lid wasn't even cooked on top of the casserole. I was given a completely virgin oval of pastry next to the dish.

I was outraged

I agree but my dh doesn't like the pastry underneath so I make them without. He'll only eat puff pastry too so it's the least of my worries

So I'm not alone :)

I did wonder if it was some health kick thing but then if you were that fussed about it then you wouldn't even order a pie.

It's all wrong.

and you can't get into the dish so you take the top off and you are just eating stew jut make a bloody pie and give it to me to scoff, the daybreak chef was making leak and chicken pie the other day , No love it is a turkey stew not a pie I had pie rage

I went to a pie party recently.

Everyone had to bring a pie.

One of the rules was "a pie is not stew with a lid on".

Oooh yeah I hate not being able to cut into the pie... ! And I love the soggy pastry at the bottom..

I'm feeling the pie rage on this thread :) it's cheered me up.

YABU Pies are either.

Maybe you need the Americanism "pot pie" introduced to distinguish the types?

I hate this too - and having had some experience of a professional kitchen I can tell you it's down to nothing more than sheer laziness! Those laughable little ovals of pastry on the side come straight from freezer to oven to your plate in a minute - same with the ones just plonked on top. I don't know what they should call it - but a pie it ain't!

One of the rules was "a pie is not stew with a lid on".

Quite right too .

TBH i am a rubbish cook so can't make pies so I only eat a pie if im out and I am really dissapointed

Just read this to DH...he totally agrees with you and says its pubs being cheapskate...he says its trade descriptions...and not to get him started!!! When we go out he always asks if it is a proper pie with top/bottom/sides and a filling..if not won't order it!! He says we ought to have a national protest

I wondered this 18 years ago when I first moved to UK. I worked in a pub cooking and this is how I was instructed to make "pies". I've seen them everywhere like this.

The lid was cooked alone - the "pie" filling heated in a ramekin, pastry lid baked & then plonked on top (lazy food).

So YANBU to wonder, but it's far from a new thing.

(Laughing at national pie protest day) :)

Ooooooo, this also gets my goats!!!

It's laziness. Hear that, pubs? Laziness.

Every pie deserves a bottom. That's how the world works.

We used to have these sometimes at home, they were called floaty pies. Usually rhubarb or steak & kidney. A pie should have a bottom unless otherwise specified though.

MY mum makes her steak pie in a large dish and puts her pastry on top but the dish is huge so you can cut a slice I let her off cos it is so tasty,

It's called a "top crust" pie and I agree it isn't really a pie without a pastry bottom.

Sometimes though that's too much pastry innit?

when I make a casserole I sometimes cut some pasrty and and have pastry squares I don't call it a pie though

Ooh Trills I love the idea of a pie party! Dp would move me though, he's still laughing aboute saying I wanted to join the Pudding Club

Sometimes though that's too much pastry innit?

If it s puff pastry then yes too much puff but shortcrust is fine

I was recently served this type of 'pie' in a pub but the whole thing had been doused in gravy so the pie dish was sitting in a pool of gravy. It just seemed really yuk and unhygienic. The pastry was undercooked - it was all just wrong!!!

DH makes them like this - cant be bothered to rollout, line dish, bake blind...

Still I guess its still a "pie" of sorts but probably if we had the time we would prefer to have the real thing with pastry top and bottom.

Oh and we are strictly home made shortcrust pastry, none of that tasteless puff crap!

IME, steak pies have always been stew (sometimes with bits of sausage in it) with a thick puff pastry lid. You have to cook it with the pastry on top, so you get crispy pastry in the top layers and (delicious) soggy pastry where it's been in the gravy.