A rant.

Right, so when did pies stop being pies? Sorry, but a filled ceramic pot with a puff pastry lid is NOT a pie. A pie is something you should be able to carry in your pocket, if you're mental. The pastry, whether short crust or puff, should completely encase the filling...that's why it's called a filling! It also now seems to be the done thing to serve a pie with a hint of mash, as if the point of it is to infuse the pie with a subtle potato hue. Pie should be served with an amount of mash greater than or equal to the size of the pie (there's an actual mathematical equation somewhere - ask Hawking), not with a pastry cutter-shaped mound that ironically lacks any of the aesthetic quality intended by the chef and in fact robs it of its charm.

The point of pie and mash is that it's rough and ready, meaning it should not lack any of its flavour or appeal if, God forbid, it isn't overly-ponced over. Proper pub grub - hearty, filling and tasty - seems to be dying out, and I blame the gentrification of pubs (that we should all now refer to as 'bars') and the rise of the disgustingly-named 'gastropubs' for this modern snobbery. Its the arseheaded TV chefs that we are constantly bombarded with that are to blame as well; their part in the rise of food culture in this country is a great thing, but it should be about trying new and exciting cuisines, not pissing about with what already works. Pub food is served in a pub, and should be food you fight the temptation to push your face into to eat, not delicately deliberate over in bird's-mouth forkings.

I know it's not a pub, so you can argue against the example, but the bistro I went to last night is representative of this growing problem. Firstly, it didn't actually serve any bistro food. This is not a new thing to me, as over the past month I've seen several places that refer to themselves as bistros and brasseries that serve English and Italian food exclusively. Looking through the menu, the thing that looked the most substantially filling was the steak pie and mash, so I ordered that. Proper Steak Pie, the menu proclaimed, with smashing mash, veg and proper gravy. I was served my pie (in a ceramic dish, obviously) with a spoonful of mash and some roughly chopped carrots and broccoli. Dry. So I waited. Then I wanted a bit more. Finally I got a waiter's attention and said that I thought my meal came with gravy. He told me that there should be enough gravy in the pie. Errrrr, no; even if there had been more than the slight congealed paste that made the steak filling cling to my fork for dear life, it still wouldn't have been anywhere near enough for my dry mash and veg. THAT is not proper pie. Or proper gravy. Down south we drown it in that shit, and I'm sure in most traditional places up here they do too. When he came to collect my plate, he sarcastically asked "was it OK, apart from there not being enough gravy?" like I was the weirdo! If they did actually serve stuff like boeuf bourguignon or coc au vin I bet they wouldn't be devoid of the moist parts. So what gives?

Pie and mash is one of my favourite meals in the world, and I am sick of it being dicked about with. People of Britain, it's a fading culture and we need to claim back our proper pub food; proper fish and chips, proper ploughman's lunches, proper Sunday roasts, proper lasagne and, in particular, our proper pie and mash. And now I'm still bloody starving!