Sunday 4 May 2008

Clarkes Quality Meats & Country Kitchen

We headed south in three cars to Scole on the May Day weekend to sample another new pork pie... These were small pork pies from Clarkes Quality Meats & Country Kitchen, Low Lane, Hevingham – found on the Internet! To work up our appetite for this weeks offering, we had a very warm walk on both sides of the A140 enjoying the shade of the church in Scole for our lunch stop. Giada especially, after chasing after a Muntjac deer at break-neck speed over a considerable distance - she didn’t catch her new friend. We then took a refreshing pint of Young’s at the Horseshoes at Billingford before returning to the cars. After tea and canapés (spicy prawns, this week) had been served, the pork pies were carved into thirds. They had the external appearance of a traditional mince pie, not made of hot water pastry. The pastry had gone a little soft at the bottom, probably a result of keeping them in the fridge for two days. The pastry for some scored highly and for others it was a disappointment, reflected in the high standard deviation of the scores. The meat filling was pink and very tasty – no one electing to add mustard. These pies came in with a very respectable 8.15 with standard deviation of 0.94428, so a normalised 8 for Clarkes.