They say nothing comes easy in this life – and you get your reward from hard graft and what you put into it. That epitomises the hard work that chef Chris Brumby has put into his pie making business “MyPie” – which has taken the London street food markets and the Pierate Pie Rankings by storm! And we were delighted to attend the media opening of his new pop up restaurant last night on the roof terrace of John Lewis, Oxford Street (one of the most famous roads in the world!)

The MyPie Restaurant on the rooftop of John Lewis, Oxford Street

Welcome to the MyPie Restaurant!

We first met Chris in March 2014, when Pierateer Tim met him for a chat and of course a pie down in South London. Chris had recently just won the Red Lion Barnes Great Sausage Roll Off a few months earlier, but we were glad his passion lied more in pies than just sausage rolls. And despite a little boil out, we could tell that Chris was on a winning trail when he let us pie rate his Beef and Red wine pie, which was Pierate Highly Recommended at 6/7 on the seven Cs of pie rating. Not bad for a first effort!!

It didn’t take Chris long to get a pie near the top of our pie rankings, with his Chicken, Smoked Ham and Tarragon pie rating in at a whopping 6.39/7 in July 2015, swiftly followed by several other MyPie offerings making the top 10 of the rankings. But the most im-pie-ressive of them all was the Steak and Ale pie, which rated at a phenomenal 6.61/7.

There's even a skating rink!

While at the time this score ranked at number 3 on the pie rankings list, the sad demise of a fellow pie maker meant that in October 2016 the pie rankings were updated and the Steak and Ale pie became our number 1 rated pie on Pierate, a position it has held on to for over two years now!

Since then, the Steak and Ale pie has been joined in the top ten by MyPie’s Venison, Chilli and Cheese (6.57/7 in 2nd place) and Mince, Bacon and Cheese (6.46/7 in 7th place). MyPie really do set the bar high for pie making in London and the rest of the country! And we’re delighted to see the company providing the food at the skyline rooftop terrace for John Lewis’ winter wonderland!

One of the lovely hideaways you can book up to eat your pie in!

During our visit last night we were treated to a number of starters from the MyPie range, including scotch eggs and sausage rolls, but what we were there for was of course the pies! Being a launch event we were served some smaller pies than will be available when the restaurant opens on Saturday but believe me, these were still delicious and up to the usual MyPie standard! And being smaller, it meant we felt less guilty trying a couple each!!

The Hampshire Steak, Mushroom and Truffle Oil pie Click here to view all the MyPie pies we have reviewed.

Pierateer Tim went for the Sweet Potato, Green Chilli and Feta pie (which interestingly was flavoured really well with the chilli but not spicy – something that again highlights Chris’ chef background!) and the Free Range Chicken, Ownton’s Butchers bacon and sweetcorn pie. Pierateer Rob went for the Hampshire Steak, Mushroom and Truffle Oil pie, followed by the Venison, Chestnut Mushrooms and Juniper pie (which is in collaboration with Sipsmith Gin London, who are running the bar on the roof terrace).

Pierateer Tim, MyPie owner Chris and Pierateer Rob

Unsurprisingly all the pies were well filled, flavoursome and left us wanting more! We can see this being a great success for the three month residency MyPie have on the rooftop terrace and hope that customers to John Lewis from near and far will very much enjoy the best pies in London as they have pie in the sky!

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To book your seat at the rooftop terrace restaurant just click here: https://www.resdiary.com/restaurant/mypie

RAS

Pierate is a pie review website charting a course to find the ultimate pie. For all the pies we have reviewed have a look at our Pie Rankings or find pies of a particular flavour under Pies: Categorised. Make sure you Follow @pierateers and let us know your thoughts!

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One of the things we really enjoy on the Pierate Ship is meeting the guys and girls up and down the land who make the pies that we really enjoy eating. As such we’ve created a “Meet the Pie-ducer” series of interviews, where we lift the lid on those who are looking to piefect their trade…

Calum Franklin

The pie page on the Holborn Dining Room website begins with the slightly understated first line of "Holborn Dining Room Executive Head Chef Calum Franklin has kept London foodies talking with his artful creations..."

I'd personally say less talking, more drooling! For the craftsmanship on Calum's pastry creations would be enough to make anyone go "wow!" as he creates pastry decor to pie-fection - some of which take over 4 hours to create, such is the intricate detail in the pastry work (see the tweet below). When he kindly allowed me to join him for a chat during British Pie Week, he only had half of his giant, multi-layered Pork and Black Pudding Pie left, such had been the demand for it. And that certainly wasn't the first one of those giant pies he'd made that week! Sure, there may have been a bit of spike in demand during Pie Week, but people were coming from near and far to get just a slither of one of Calum's top notch pies!

On the a la carte menu, Calum is looking forward to releasing his new Mutton Curry Pie, one which he says he is particularly looking forward to seeing the reaction to. These certainly aren't your typical pies - and the customers at Holborn Dining Room would expect nothing less - so the bar is always set high and Calum is certainly delivering.

Having originally trained in Birmingham at the then College of Food, Tourism and Creative Studies (now UCB), Calum has been at Holborn Dining Room for three years now and is keen to change the menu slightly from having just one pie on rotation to a wider ranged pie menu. There are plans in place to provide a steak and kidney steamed suet pie, alongside a chicken, mushroom and cider shortcrust pie and the Mutton Curry Pie in puff pastry - alongside the classic pork pies they already sell. Different flavours, different pastries. Calum and his team of chefs are being trained up well to rise to the challenge of professional pie making.

Calum Franklin Pork and Black Pudding Pie at Holborn Dining Room

It was the training element that Calum mentioned which really got my attention as we chatted. Having admitted when he first started in pastry that he had quite a lot to learn, he is now not happy just to master the art himself, but he is training up the pastry chefs of tomorrow in his kitchen. Trainee chefs from around the UK (and even the world) have been requesting time to learn skills in pastry work with Calum, and they could certainly go far worse than learning from the pastry master himself! And with plans to create a dedicated pie room with a serving hatch onto the street, they really are taking their pies seriously!

Just put this in the oven for Dave's great Zelman Bake Off pic.twitter.com/ftlv5xWLwg

— calum franklin (@chefcalum) March 23, 2017

We very much enjoyed our taster in pie week and look forward to visiting Holborn Dining Room to rate the selection of pies on the pie menu once it launches! Until then, we'll just have to stick to drooling over the pie photos Calum regularly posts on his Twitter feed! Many thanks to Calum for meeting us and donating a few slices of pie to us to try!

RAS


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With a swathe of their pies in our top 20 pies (out of over 600 we have rated) you won’t be surprised to hear we eagerly await any new offering from the number one modern pie shop in London - Piebury Corner. With such a high bar set by their meat and veggie pies, the more recent addition of fruit pies to their selection (albeit not that recently!) was something we were intrigued by. Could Piebury – famed for their football-related pies and puns – still push for the title with their fruit pies? Or was it a case of second season blues – like Leicester City struggling to maintain the form they showed in their previous outing?

Piebury Corner Fruit Pie Review

Well the good news is that these fruit pies are far off mid-table mediocrity! In fact, as fruit pies go, these are some of the better individual fruit pies we’ve pie rated. Gone are the Arsenal-related footballer names (such as the “Thierry Henry” or “Viera-getarian”) and instead you get pies that do exactly what they say on the tin (or in this case, cardboard box) – Apple, Apple and Blackcurrant, Blueberry and Cherry.

Here’s our overall impression of the fruit pie range, followed by some individual comments. Please note that all these pies were heated for 20 minutes in the oven but then eaten as they were – without custard or cream or other additions – to ensure we were rating the pie accurately.



Overall Im-pie-ression:

Piebury Corner Fruit Pie Review

These pies are noticeably quite shallow and wide, but this is the Piebury way! Similar in shape to their meaty teammates, the fruit pies also have a lovely golden pastry shell which particularly crisps up well on top. The main difference: that fine sprinkling of sugar on top of the pastry, which does add that extra sweet taste to an already sweet fruit pie! A couple of the pies we cooked caught slightly and were a bit more golden in some places than others, but overall I’d say this is a nice golden colour.

At £3.50 per pie to take away cold, these certainly aren’t the cheapest fruit pies on the market. But then these aren’t your typical pies on the market either – with a much bigger capacity than most fruit pie boxes you’d buy in the shops and a strong pie capacity as opposed to some of the “fruit” air pies you can get your hands on! I also mention fruit because you can actually see and taste the fruit in these pies, rather than the fruity mush that a lot of fruit pies contain.

Overall, I would say these are a tad expensive for the size, but they are some of the best fruit pies we’ve had on Pierate. The pastry (specifically the lid) is delicious as part of the pie or even eaten on its own. While the content of all the pies is nice and fruity – sweet but generally not too much! They fill the hole and – while I’d suggest you probably wouldn’t want two in one sitting – leave you wanting to try another!

Piebury Corner Apple Pie Review

Apple

The classic fruit pie flavour and done well. Some decent sized pies of fruit – though could perhaps have been a few more large pieces that had a bit more of a bite to them. They were rather soft, so not much to bite onto! The flavour worked well with the crisp sweet pastry. Would definitely want again.

Piebury Corner Apple and Blackcurrant Pie Review

Apple and Blackcurrant

Another classic fruit flavour – the apple was nice but again could have perhaps given a bit more bite to the pie if they were a bit less soft. The blackcurrants were also very noticeable, particularly because the seeds got rather caught in my teeth during the eating of this pie, which spoilt my enjoyment of it a bit. However a good balance to the flavour and in combination with the pastry.

Piebury Corner Blueberry Pie Review

Blueberry

We don’t seem to see many blueberry pies out there on the market, so Pierateer Sam was particularly keen to try this one. While quite sweet, the flavour was very nice and again complimented the crisp pastry well. Well worth getting hold of.

Piebury Corner Cherry Pie Review

Cherry

While perhaps not as famous as the apple pie, the cherry pie is still another regular flavour and the pieces of fruit were very obvious upon slicing through. Quite sweet again, but not overpowering. I’d happily eat another of these.





Overall, while these pies are not going to compete against the Piebury Corner meat pies for our affection, they are very good individual fruit pies that I’d happily enjoy for dessert as part of a “Double Pie” main and pudding option. I’m Gunner have to go back to Piebury Corner and get some more soon!

Piebury Corner Apple Pie
Score: 5.89/7
[Colour 6.5, Capacity 6.25, Consistency 5.75, Condition 6, Chewiness 5.5, Cheapness 5, Content 6.25]

Piebury Corner Apple and Blackcurrant Pie
Score: 5.75/7
[Colour 6.5, Capacity 6.25, Consistency 5.5, Condition 6, Chewiness 5.25, Cheapness 5, Content 5.75]

Piebury Corner Blueberry Pie
Score: 5.89/7
[Colour 6.5, Capacity 6.25, Consistency 5.75, Condition 6, Chewiness 5.5, Cheapness 5, Content 6.25]

Piebury Corner Cherry Pie
Score: 5.82/7
[Colour 6.5, Capacity 6.25, Consistency 5.5, Condition 6, Chewiness 5.25, Cheapness 5, Content 6.25]

RAS

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MyPie London Steak and Ale Pie Review

Street Food Markets are a great place to sample the delights of the local food scene and of course London has more than its fair share of food providers! So this weekend, basking in the sunshine of a late September heat wave, two Pierateers headed down to London’s South Bank Street Food Market, at the back of the South Bank Centre, for another taste of MyPie.

You may have heard of the name. After all, MyPie have already had their Chicken pie rated as the highest ranking Chicken pie in London at 6.39/7. And we just recently announced that Chris’ pies will be headlining our 6th Birthday Pie-rty on 14th November, which we’re really looking forward to!

So what pie were we rating this time?

MyPie London Steak and ale pie review

Well, it’s no secret from a quick glance at our 500+ pie rankings that we’re rather a fan of steak and ale pies, so knowing that Chris had this flavour in his repertoire, we knew we needed to get our hands on this pie! However it became clear after Pierateer Rob first sampled these pies that there was something particularly special about them, which was why Pierateer Sam (on Saturday) and Pierateer Rob (on Sunday) popped down to London to officially pie rate these steak and ale beauties!

MyPie London Pie Truck

With such a large number of food suppliers at the South Bank Street Food Market, you had to infiltrate the hustle and bustle of the market to get across to the MyPie truck, hidden away slightly at the back of the market. However with its distinctive red and white décor and the word “pie” on it numerous times, it wasn’t hard to know we were in the right place! This was our first experience of being served from the converted ice cream van’s hatch, as Pierateer Rob had previously met Chris in Wimbledon to get his hands on the chicken and steak pies.

Service was quick and easy, with the main dilemma being “mash or mustard mash” and how much gravy to have with the pie and mash. Of course being a piefessional, Pierateer Rob opted to have the pie in one tray and the mash doused in gravy in the other. When you’re rating a pie, you want to just rate the pie. No excuses for additional mash/gravy influencing the rating where at all possible!

So how was the steak and ale pie? Well… “wow!” Does that help? Perhaps “one of the best pies I’ve ever eaten” is a bit more descriptive? After over 500 pies being rated on the web’s leading pie review blog it can be hard to get amazed at filling fully encased in pastry anymore. But there you would be wrong!

MyPie London Steak and ale pie review

The pastry on the MyPie steak and ale pie is near spot on. It’s crisp on the outside and a bit softer and gooey in the middle, not too thick but with great structural integrity. You can pick it up with your hand. You can cut easily through it with cutlery (even plastic cutlery!) and most importantly it just tastes delicious. End of! A key indicator we look at with pastry is “would I eat this pastry on its own, without filling?” – and the answer with MyPie pastry is a definite “of course I would!!!” While you could perhaps give it a slight critique that the design is quite simple, it stands tall and proud, just like the ultimate pie should!

But a pie is not pastry alone – as we recently pointed out when being interviewed for a national newspaper. It is the balance between filling and pastry, which we refer to as the filling:pastry ratio, that really makes or breaks a pie. And this pie’s ratio is near piefection. Never was I thinking there’s too much filling or (as is more common on lower quality pies) there’s too much pastry. The ratio was spot on, with a near full capacity of filling in the pie.

The flavour of the filling was so nice and meaty and the steak so tender. It had a small amount of veg, a nice taste of herbs and a flavoursome aley gravy, which gave it a slightly fruity feel. Fantastic – a bit like a casserole that my grannie would have made (except much nicer). The gravy was just the right thickness to be moist but not leak all over you.

The pie had been slightly stronger seasoned in the first pies that we both tried than in the second samples, with the stronger seasoned pie (rosemary and pepper) more to Sam’s taste and the slightly less seasoned one more to Rob’s. We put this slight variation down to these pies being handmade in small batches, with a bit of season variation such as the rosemary available in Chris’ garden when we tried the first pies, which was less apparent in the second pies. But the bottom line is that we both thought these were all some of the best pies we’d ever had, and the best we’d had this year.

Chris has done a fabulous job with these pies and we wish him and his MyPie em-pie-re all the best for his exciting future expansion plans! With pies like these, he is definitely onto a winner! They are once again Pierate Highly Recommended and at the time of reviewing are the new top pie in London!

MyPie Steak and Ale Pie
Score: 6.61/7
[Colour 6.75, Capacity 6.75, Consistency 6.5, Condition 6.5, Chewiness 6.75, Cheapness 6.5, Content 6.5, Total: 6.61/7]
RAS and SJL

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Punch Tavern Game and Fish Pie Reviews

Punch Tavern, Fleet Street

Once again, Pierateers RAS and TJP came knocking at the Punch Tavern on London’s Fleet Street to see if they could deliver some more knock-out pies.

It was November 2014 when RAS and TJP first tried the pies at this gin-friendly gastropub - and what great pies they were! The chicken pie clucked up a Pierate 'Highly Recommended' 6.02/7, while the rabbit pie jumped in at 5.92/7.

This time, RAS and TJP were hungry for the game pie and the fish pie - and with the standard set so high last time, will their dreams be shot down or will it be 'squids in' at the Punch Tavern?

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My Pie Free Range Chicken, Smoked Ham and Tarragon Pie Review

What filling! What capacity! The My Pie Chicken pie

It was a pleasure last week as part of my #LondonPie tour of our nation's capital to meet some London pie makers and one of them was Chris Brumby, who has set up "My Pie" in London. You may recognise the owner's name because Pierateer TJP actually had the pleasure of meeting Chris slightly over a year ago, before the business kicked off in it's current form and the pie truck (see below) had actually been purchased, and Chris' Beef and Red Wine pie was rated at a very impressive 6/7 (Pierate Highly Recommended).

It was clear from that first interaction that the pie business was still in its infancy at that stage and while it has taken a while to finally get our hands on some more of the pies, we're delighted we have! We were given a number of pies to rate and are slowly making our way through them, but the chicken pie I had first off was so good I wanted to make sure I got the review up on the blog! Other pie reviews, and a brief pie maker profile based on our chat, will be posted in the coming weeks, but first of all let's get cracking with our first pie review and the delightfully tasting:

Free Range Chicken, Smoked Ham and Tarragon Pie

My Pie Chicken Pie Review

The chicken, ham and tarragon pie was lovely and golden in colour – and quite simply one of the best pies I've seen to look at. It just misses out on colour pie-fection due to the slightly different shades from paler to strongly gold across the side of the pie, but it's about as close as you could reasonably expect. The lid, in particular, was crisp and golden like all meat pies should be. It almost felt rude to cut into it!

But hey, we’ve not got to over 500 pie reviews by just looking at – and not cutting into – the delightful pies we are presented with aboard the Pierate Ship! The knife cut with a pleasing crunch through the top pastry, and while the base seemed a little thicker (probably to hold in all the meati-licious filling I’m about to get to…) it held together very well. The pie passed the “hand held” test with flying colours too and the filling didn't leak out all over the place (like one with too much gravy or sauce and loosely filled might do).

Filled to near capacity, with just a small air gap, the filling was very good. The content was large chunks of tender chicken which were delicious and the white creamy sauce complemented the chicken and pieces of ham well. It was certainly one of the best white sauces I have had in a chicken pie and it was pleasing to see decent pieces of ham in there. The ham clearly wasn’t just an afterthought, as can be the impression in some chicken and ham pies we rate, which is pleasing. Both the ham and tarragon were noticeable and flavoursome, but not dominating the flavour of the pie. All in all, to be able to get two of these pies cold for £7 is good value and it’s a very high scoring Pierate Highly Recommended pie!

My Pie Free Range Chicken, Smoked Ham and Tarragon Pie
Score: 6.39/7
[Colour 6.5, Capacity 6.25, Consistency 6.5, Condition 6.5, Chewiness 6.5, Cheapness 6, Content 6.5, Total: 6.39/7]
RAS

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The Pierateers are on the search for more London Pie Reviews!

Pierate is a pie review website where we rate pies of all kinds - sweet, meat, even those without the wheat! We rate all the pies, so that you can just eat the best of the best! Combine that with the many people will visit London and wonder where they can get the best pie from and you get the "Best Pies in London Restaurants" article we've regularly updated with the top London pies we've rated. It's even our most viewed article on Pierate now!

The EDF Energy London Pie

Whether it's been the many great pies at Piebury Corner pie deli on Holloway Road - currently top of our London leaderboard - or our recently reviewed Pierate Highly Recommended Steak and Kidney pie at The Windmill, there are plenty of top rated pies in London! So many in fact that we still have so much London pie left to rate!

Which is why we Pierateers, the web's leading pie reviewers and pie experts to the BBC, are looking for some more London pie to rate! Using the rather unimaginative hashtag #LondonPie (to coincide with us turning the London Eye into the London Pie above...) we're on the hunt for more London pies to rate this coming weekend, which will culminate with Pierateers RAS and TJP meeting for a London pie next Monday evening! The question though is where?!

London pie establishments - lend us your pies!

Yes - we're eyeing up the pies and looking to see who wants us to give their pies a rating! Maybe there's a new pie shop or restaurant not yet on our "Best Pies in London Restaurants" list who want to invite us round for a pie rating? Or there might be a pie establishment already on our list who have just released a new pie flavour and want to show it off to the pie eating world, potentially boosting them up the London pie leaderboard? Either way, we're up for some pie and will be looking out for invites to try some pies this coming weekend - and specifically on Monday night!

So if you're a pie seller in London - particularly a restaurant open on Monday night - we'd love to hear from you and come to rate your pies! Just send us a tweet @pierateers!

London Pie-tinery!

Saturday - Not quite sure if there will be pies there or not, but Pierateer RAS is heading to the #USABeerFest at @thegundocklands for a good old 4th of July par-tay, featuring an All-American BBQ! The big question is will there be American pie for dessert?!?! We'll be meeting friend and Honourary Pierateer Ashleigh there too, who is Managing Director of Auld Digital and a big fan of Pierate!
Update: Sadly the American pies desserted us (get it!) but it was still a good BBQ meal and great company!

Sunday - The most likely day for Pierateer RAS to swing by Pierate Highly Recommended pie shop Piebury Corner - looking to rate their sweet pies and get his hands on their British Pie Awards Gold winning Theo Walcott Pie (Jerk Chicken flavour)
Update: Mission accomplished! - I pillaged some great looking pies from Piebury Corner and had a great chat with business owners Paul and Julie. They're closing the shop for a few weeks over July but I can assure you there will be queues out the door when they re-open in time for the Emirates Cup competition! Visit pieburycorner.com for opening hours info.

Monday - It's the big one! Pierateer RAS and TJP are meeting up - and you know that when two Pierateers meet up there is bound to be pie involved! We're planning to visit The Punch Tavern on Fleet Street, where we visited last November and had some top rated pies and gins! Can't wait to try their new pie offerings, including a pastry-based sea food pie and a game pie!
Update: We had two lovely pies from the Punch Tavern - but could they live up to amazingly high standards of last November's offerings? You'll find out soon when we rate them! We also had the two Piebury Corner fruit pies for dessert when we got home.

Tuesday - We've arranged to meet up with pie business owner Dee of Dees Pies fame on Tuesday morning and then shortly after will be meeting pie truck owner (yes, you read that right - PIE TRUCK OWNER) Chris Brumby to find out about his latest pie selling venture - "My Pie". We actually rated one of his pies before the truck had even been bought and he was selling pies to the masses, and that was so good it was Pierate Highly Recommended! Of course it will be rude of us not to try a few more of his pies...
Update: I think I need a bigger suitcase with built in fridge! I was given 10 pies to take home from Dee and Chris, so no pie-rizes for guessing what I'll be eating all this week!!!


On top of all this somehow Pierateer RAS plans to catch up with a few friends and his Goddaughter this weekend too!!! Of course you'll be able to follow our London pie tour using the #LondonPie hashtag all weekend!

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The Windmill, Mayfair - Steak and Kidney Pie Review

There are some places with great reputations for pies but for whatever reason it takes us a long time to get there to review them. The Windmill is one such place. It is in Mayfair, London and with all the other London pies we have reviewed, why is it not one of them?! However, it has eluded us for some time, in part because their restaurant is closed for much of the weekend, so I was excited to finally pay them a visit on Day Four of British Pie Week 2015.
 

What a time to visit. The Windmill seemed quite busy but when it is a pub with a specific 'Pie Room' of course it would be busy in British Pie Week! The Windmill had really got into the spirit of British Pie Week with a competition. If you could eat 5 different pies in the week you would get a 6th pie free, along with a t-shirt! I have eaten a lot of pies during British Pie Week in the past, but even I was surprised at this high requirement. But apparently there are some people who manage it!

Rosa is a long time Pierate supporter

The Windmill is one of those places that will get any pie fan excited. The Lower Pie Room (yes, there are actually two pie rooms, eat your heart out Newman Arms!) where I was eating was a bit of shrine to pies and they seem to be particularly proud of their Steak & Kidney pie. There were pictures and placemats all proclaiming it as a 'Champion Steak & Kidney Pie' and 'Three times national winner'. I was unsure what award it had actually won, but they certainty seemed confident in the Steak & Kidney's quality. There was a whole menu devoted to pies and some interesting flavours. Haggis was tempting but in the end I thought I had to see what all the fuss was about and ordered the Steak & Kidney. Could it challenge near the top of our best pies in London ranking?

Firstly, I was delighted when this pie came out and it was fully encased in pastry. This was the pie experience I had been hoping for. Pierateer RAS and myself had visited The Windmill's sister pub (The Guinea Grill) in 2012 and found the pies were top-crusts. Not a hint of that here though.
The pie came served on a long rectangular plate, with nicely presented mash and veg. The pie did not look particularly large or spectacular, but I think the wonderful, crispy, golden pastry hinted at something quite special. It is amazing what a good glaze can do to a pie.

Slicing into the pie revealed there were two different aspects to the pastry, the crispy outside cracked to reveal predominately soft gooey pastry inside. The pie was packed with a thick, rich meaty filling which, happily for me, did not taste too strongly of kidney. What delighted me most was the fact that they had used suet crust pastry. I think this gives a wonderful taste to the pastry as well as a rich meaty flavour to the whole product, as with Paul's pies which we so highly regard. In fact this was very similar to Paul's Pies but with softer pastry.

How did it rate? I would straight away put this as the best Steak & Kidney pie I have ever had. The meal was small for the £12.50 price but I found it filling. Whilst it might be more expensive than some, for the quality, the location and the overall experience I considered the price was decent value. I am very keen to go back and try some more of The Windmill pies. See the score breakdown below. Overall the score of 6.25 puts this second on our list of best London restaurant pies, quite an achievement given how many places we have reviewed. It also means this pie gains 'Pierate Highly Recommended' status and slots in inside our Top 30 pies as the top Steak & Kidney pie.

Condition – 5.50 out of 7 – The presentation of the meal looks gourmet but the pie itself is unassuming in appearance.
Colour – 6.95 out of 7 – Am I allowed to give a perfect 7? I just can't imagine a better colour, this is what made me realise the pie would be great.
Cheapness – 5.40 out of 7 – It is better to have a small, really good pie than loads of a really bad pie (cf the pie which made me sick)
Capacity - 6.50 out of 7 - The domed lid indicated a strong amount of filling. No real air gap to speak of.
Chewiness - 6.50 out of 7 - Soft and moist beef, the texture was super. If anything the texture of the pastry was a little too soft and it lacked the structure I would expect from the ultimate pie.
Content - 6.30 out of 7 - Rich and meaty but I can't get away from the fact that Kidney isn't my favourite...
Consistency - 6.60 out of 7 - It worked extremely well with the suet pastry complementing the beefy filling. Whilst there wasn't much to criticise this pie for, could another flavour challenge the top of our pie charts?

After the meal it was very nice of the manager, Karl, to come over from The Guinea Grill to talk to us. He seemed pretty passionate about pies and creating new flavours. I suspected that the pie flavours written on the chalk board could be subject to change based on his latest creations. I also learnt that The Windmill use the same pie filling recipes as The Guinea Grill, however, they just choose not to fully encase them at The Guinea (madness!). I did also get to the bottom of the issue about the awards their Steak & Kidney pie had won. Apparently, it was a now defunct Steak & Kidney pie award in London and the three wins were over a decade ago, before the British Pie Awards had even started! It may seem that this is somewhat living on past glories but they have certainly not rested on their laurels. This is still a great pie and with a changing pie menu, I would certainly recommend a visit to The Windmill.

Note: We have suggested to Karl to enter the British Pie Awards but he says that because the pies have to be pre-cooked, it wouldn't work with his suet pastry very well. Perhaps it's about time there was a restaurant pie award as part of the BPA or elsewhere?

Steak & Kidney (The Windmill [W1S 2AZ])
6.25/7

SJL

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The pie is golden in colour - a little more yellowy than I am used too. The lid has a nice shiny glazed surface. The pies are obviously hand-made, which is good, but I would have liked to have seen a bit more attention paid to the condition of the pie - some nice crimping, for example, would have been a good addition.

When I cut the pie open, I note that there is a rather underwhelming amount of filling. The photo below shows one half of the pie, showing you the lack of filling. The other half of the pie was more filled than that, but I struggled to get a good photo as my hands were full. However, this photo does highlight the rather disappointing amount of filling. There were only a few chunks of chicken in my pie - personally I would have expected more filling for the price I paid for this pie.


On tasting, I noted a lovely taste of tarragon and mushroom along with the chicken. In my opinion the filling that was there certainly tasted nice, and the chunks of chicken were high quality with no gristle or chewy meat..

The pastry lid was nice and crispy, but the base and sides were rather soggy and floppy. I initially tried picking up this pie with my hands but I had to put it down again as it felt as if the base was going to break apart.

This pie initially looked large, but actually it felt like this was an illusion - once you got past the pastry lid, the pie was rather shallow and underfilled. My appetite wasn't sated after one pie. You can make up your own mind, and maybe their other pies are better (and I got a dodgy one), but I personally won't be rushing back to Hoxton Pastry Union. That said, the gravy was actually delicious! Some of the best I've had.

Hoxton Pastry Union Chicken Pie Review
Score 3.9/7
TJP

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Punch Tavern Chicken and Rabbit Pie Reviews

It was Halloween, and Pierateer RAS and TJP headed to the Punch Tavern on London’s Fleet Street to see if this Grade II listed pub can deliver some knock out pies. Nestled within the bright lights and throbbing streets of central London, this well-regarded gastropub promises to serve up freshly-prepared traditional British fare. We had pre-ordered the rabbit and chicken pies before arrival to avoid disappointment, and settled in with a gin and tonic amongst the original 1897 Punch and Judy décor to enjoy our evening.

Great to see them pie-moting their top pies!

Punch Tavern Chicken Pie

Punch Tavern Chicken Pie - cross-sectional view

Punch Tavern Rabbit Pie

Punch Tavern Rabbit Pie - cross-sectional view

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