British Pie Week 2016 - Day Six

With the British Pie Awards judging having been completed and the results of the competition still sending shock waves around the world of pie - you can see our article on the controversial winner here - Day Six of British Pie Week saw Pierateers RAS and SJL meet up to (surprise, surprise) eat some pies together. However these weren't any pies - they were the Scotch Pie and Apple Pie from none-other than the 2014 and 2016 Scotch Pie World Champion The Kandy Bar Bakery!

You may recall that on day four of British Pie Week Pierateer RAS completed the final stage of his #TriPie pie pledge. He headed up to Scotland for the first time to visit the home of the World Scotch Pie Champion for 2014 and 2016, The Kandy Bar Bakery in Saltcoats, on the West Coast about 40 minutes train journey from Glasgow.



The Kandy Bar Bakery, Saltcoats, Scotland

Pie in the Sky!

On Thursday Rob had been made to feel very welcome by Stephen and the team, having a tour around the bakery and then a long chat of about 90 minutes or so in the café, which of course included getting his hands on one of their famous Scotch Pies! Needless to say it was fantastic to chat for so long with Stephen and his wife Rona, who gave a great insight into Team Kandy Bar! Rob even had "pie in the sky" on the plane journey home - just, well, because I could!


But Saturday was the day Pierateer SJL had planned to come up to Birmingham to join Rob in giving the Scotch pie and apple pie from The Kandy Bar Bakery a proper pie rating! We don't want to give it all away until the full review coming later this week, but needless to say that the Scotch pie was one of the best we'd ever tasted and the apple pie was very good as well, even if it was a bit shallow. The apple pie contained nice chunks of apple in a crisp but buttery pastry - something Pierateer RAS particularly enjoyed! If only the Kandy Bar Bakery was fractionally nearer to the Pierateers!!!

Pierateer SJL was going to take the Onion Pie home with him to try the next day (an Onion Pie, by the way, is just a Scotch pie with added onion, rather than literally a pie with 100% onion filling!) We'll be reviewing all three pies and telling you a bit more about our trip to meet Stephen, Rona and Team Kandy Bar (which employs 83 people at present) later this week!

However earlier in the day we were very excited to see that the Pierateers had not only had a mention in the online Telegraph article about the British Pie Awards, but had also made the printed version too! Under the headline "Put a lid on it!" the Pierateers were mentioned as saying the decision to award a pasty the Supreme Winner of the British Pie Awards was "a sad day for pie fans" and that for the first time we would not be rating the winner of the awards. It's one thing to be quoted online but to make the print copy was particularly exciting! The article also included a number of differences between pies and pasties, which it seems everyone bar the British Pie Awards themselves clearly understand are two distinct food items!