Thornton’s Chocolate Birthday cake

Sunday 25th November we walked from Honningham and as it was Josie’s birthday, she bought beers at the Ugly Bug – the Ugly Bug Ale was quite a hit. On returning to Honningham, we had Canapés and Cava followed by Thornton’s Chocolate Birthday cake rather than a pie (at Josie’s request) much to the disappointment of Paul Pac-Soo.

Tavern Tasty Meats

A wet walk on Sunday 18th from Rollesby, thankfully produced a dog friendly pub in Martham, where we enjoyed a good pint and Giada got treats from the landlady. The walk unfortunately did not provide good views of the futuristic “space rocket” water tower at Martham, just 40,000 gallons at TG 45926 19003. Returning to Rollesby we sampled a pie from the Sausage Shop in Holt, who sell “Tavern Tasty Meats”. We actually tried one of these pies a year ago, on the 17th of November 2006! This was sourced from Wymondham Farmer’s Market by Ricky. Our pie scored a very respectable 8.9 with a standard deviation of 0.65912; previously Tasty Tavern’s offering scored a spot on 8.5 with a standard deviation of 0.83666 (we sampled smaller pies last year, so a higher pastry to meat ratio). So a consistent showing for Tavern Tasty Meats with a normalised score of 9. The 1960's “space rocket” water tower at Martham that we didn't get a good view of. A small, 40,000 gallon tank, at TG 45926 19003.

Banham’s of Gloucester Street

I was back for the second tasting session after the wombling good walk around Great Hockam, finding quite a few cans along the way. Stopping at the Eagle public house where they didn’t allow the dogs in, their outside bin yielded another ten cans. As we got back to Great Hockam Forrest the can collecting notched up a couple of gears, filling the first carrier bag and requiring a second. Don also found a car battery – luckily for Don this was near to the end of the walk and had a carrying handle. We were well served for the pie tasting by the provision of a picnic table. The pies this week were small pork pies with a good appearance from Banham’s the butcher in Gloucester Street. The pastry was very good and the greyish filling did the business but not exceptional giving an average score of 7.88888 with a standard deviation of 0.65085, so that’s a normalised 8 for Banham’s.

G. Morris and Sons, Fat Cat public house

While I was in search of non-existent Water Towers in sunny Jersey, Don did us proud and produced two different pork pies! He also did an excellent job of recording the scores. After a walk around Bacton wood, the pie munchers gave their verdict at Briggate on a pie from G. Morris & Sons on the Heartseas: This scored 7.916666 with a standard deviation of only 0.37638. The second pie from the Fat Cat public house did slightly better scoring spot on 8 with a slightly higher standard deviation of 0.44721. So that’s a normalised 8 for both the pies. (A G. Morris & Sons pie was last sampled on 21st January this year, scoring a 7.5 and we sampled a Fat Cat pie on the 20th May when it scored an 8).

Pickerings

Sunday 28th October’s walk started wet and we started by searching the church at Chedgrave for scratch dials, of which we found two. Meanwhile Don Warman assumes we’ve started the walk and heads off down the footpath by the side of the church. We realise we’ve lost Don and return to the cars and search around but can’t find him. Don returns to the cars and doesn’t find us… We continue our walk to Hardley for the lunch stop. On returning to the cars, there is no sign of Don so we head to the pub to find him (that’s our excuse) after a pleasant drink we return to the cars to find Don with a big bag of cans! At last we can start the serious business of judging this weeks pie from Pickerings. A very pleasant pie that scored well on all counts and for the first time everyone gave the same score - an 8, even Josie tasting it at home after the walk gave it an 8. We had a Pickerings pie last October, on the 15th, where it scored a normalised 7.5 at Alby. A short Pork Pie News this month, so I’ve space to congratulate Dr. Manola of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for winning the Nobel Peace Prize – well done!

Trafalgar day - Archers (Est. 1929)

Trafalgar day saw us taking the train from Reedham Railway station to Berney Arms and walking back to the Railway Station. We called in for a pint at the Ship – unfortunately, the Lord Nelson wasn’t on the route. The good news was that we did have enough pie munchers to form a quorum and we had two medium pork pies from Archers the butchers (since 1929) recent winners of the best Norfolk Banger competition for the second time in a row. The pies had a good external appearance and released a lovely bouquet when cut. The piecrust was very good, perhaps due to the fact it was fresh – pies were still slightly warm when purchased on Saturday. The filling lacked oomph… and it wasn’t helped as the mustard had disappeared! I think mustard would have helped this pie achieve a higher score than the 7.1 on this occasion; the standard deviation was high at 0.89443. So quite an average normalised score of 7 for Archers

Fungus Foray

October the 14th was the Fungus Foray, so no pies but Risotto and Mushrooms expertly cooked by David Atkinson back at the Volunteer bar in Charles’ basement. So time for another Pie Interlude: Last month A hand-made pork pie made by Walter Smith’s butchers of Staffordshire won the top prize in a competition to find the best food product in Britain, reported the Independent. The 450g (what’s wrong with a pound?) pie made from cuts of belly and shoulder of free-range pork was named the supreme champion of the Great Taste Awards, which judges more than 4,000 food products submitted by artisanal producers from across the United Kingdom. The competition was run by the Guild of Fine Foods.