British Pie Week 2017 - Day Five

On the day of the results for the British Pie Awards we're having a bit of a London adventure, with Pierateer Rob heading down to London on a pie tour to rival all pie tours! With planned visits to Piebury Corner, Pieminister, Holborn Dining (to meet chef Calum Franklin) and The Windmill Pie Room, follow his pie antics all day right here!

The London Pie!

Plus if you read our British Pie Week - Day Four review you'll know we reached another big milestone - our 600,000th pageview! Helped by over 8,000 views of our "Everything you need to know about British Pie Week" article this already has the makings of the most viewed March pageviews in Pierate history, and we've this morning just reached 10,000 pageviews since British Pie Week started on Monday! Once again, we're delighted you've chosen us as the home of British Pie Week!

Pierateer RAS

After live blogging at the British Pie Awards on Wednesday we're looking forward to finding out the winners this lunchtime! However before we get to that, we have the small matter of another pie pledge to tick off:

You may remember from Day One that I've made four #PiePledge commitments this British Pie Week, and I'm delighted to say I've nailed one today:

- 2 days of annual leave taken to eat, rate and tweet about pies

Yep, following Wednesday's day off to live blog the British Pie Awards, today I'm getting back to the bread and butter - or should I say pie - by doing a London Pie Tour to both eat, rate, pick up and talk pie! Follow the adventure right here:

London Pie Tour Updates

09.55 - Time to catch the train down to London! Glad Chiltern Railways haven't charged me extra for my pie seat (which contains 3 new pies from Nice Pie to rate this weekend)! I'm using their free wifi to blog and tweet about pies, of course!

@pierateers All pies travel free due to them tasting so good. What kind of pie did you get?

— Chiltern Railways (@chilternrailway) March 10, 2017

11.00 - One glance at the top of our pie rankings and you'll have heard of Piebury Corner! I'm really looking forward to seeing the owners again and chatting pie, while picking up a few more of their pies for lunch with friends Barnaby and Ro! Then it will be on to Pieminister to pick up a cricket pie! (Yes, you read that right - check out our preview of the Cricket Pie here!) I'm also really looking forward to meeting Chef Calum, who has been posting the most amazing pie pastry artwork on twitter this week! And finally dinner pie at The Windmill, Mayfair, before heading for the train to Leeds for our British Pie Week Pierateer Piefest! It's gonna be busy!!!

12.15 - Arrived at Piebury Corner and was greeted by owner Paul and his wife, who told us about their latest project - a brand new shop in Kings Cross! It's due to open in a couple of months and we can't wait to tuck into a pie there when the new store opens!

Paul kindly treated us to a few pies to share with friends I'm visiting (couldn't resist another Thierry Henry Venison pie!) and we've got some fruit pies to rate this weekend! We also are now the proud owners of a Piebury Corner mug!

12.45 - Met with friends Barnaby and Ro, having a delicious venison pie from Piebury Corner. Every bit as good as I remembered!

3.45 - Got across to Pieminister (Leather Lane) and picked up the Cricket pie that we had arranged to. Had a nice chat with the owner, who told us their £5 pie and mash deal for British Pie Week was going down a storm! We'll review the cricket pie this weekend!

Chef Calum plus pie!

4.15 - I arrived at Holborn Dining to meet Chef Calum Franklin. His twitter account this past week has been full of amazing pie photos - his pastry work is exquisite - and we were delighted he could spend almost half an hour talking pie with us. Look out for our interview write up soon and a review of the pies he shared with us.

What was particularly exciting was his passion for pies and increasing the quality of the fancy pie selection they offer, as well as training new chefs in the art of pastry work. In the next couple of months, they hope to increase their pie menu to 4 pies and we hope to pay them a visit when it launches!

6.00 - Having arrived at The Windmill in Mayfair, I'm looking forward to trying some of the most eagerly anticipated pies we've heard of - after Pierateer Sam gave them Pierate Recommended status last time he visited two years ago!

We'll also find out if we're winners in their #WindmillWin com-pie-tition! Tonight pies really could win prizes!

7.30 - Well they were two very highly recommended pies! Great suet pastry, top filling! Having met up with Pierateer Tim, we went halves on a Chicken, Ham and Leek pie and a Venison pie. Also met a nice group of Kiwis on the table next to us who were enjoying their taste of UK pie! They picked a good place to start! Having to dash for a train now but looking forward to reviewing them both!

8.05 - We've caught the train from London to Leeds and look forward to kicking off our #LeedsPieTour tomorrow - not forgetting Tim's "9 pies in a day" Triple Pie-thagarous in Leeds to come!

The Ship's Cook

If you're anything like me, you're still re-watching the video we made of the wonderful cake pie made for our Pierate Piefest last summer, which you can now make yourself by following our step-by-step guide! If you like the look of it, here's the video Pierateer Tim made about our Pierate Piefest last year: