Anytime you read the words ‘The ultimate collection…’ for anything to do with cooking or food preparation, you have to be a little sceptical. Certainly, as a kiwi fella, it’s a pretty tall ask for anyone to live up to the expectations that a cookbook suggesting it is the ultimate in pie-making can create. Yet, Wendy Morgan appears to take that challenge and live up to (and often exceed) every expectation.
Pie-making is an art, one that has passed most of us by in our modern, convenience-based era of living. The perceived hassle of crafting the filling over hours of labour. Then the fiddliness of dealing with pastry, and then the frustration when the pastry doesn’t crisp enough on the top, or the bottom is just that little too saggy to make it enjoyable - for anyone. Memories of growing up with soggy-bottomed pies don’t engender huge hopes for this culinary novice.
But, there is a first time for everything. From apple to BBQ mince, tomato tart to good ol’ smoked fish, everything made was delicious, straightforward, and not a soggy-bottomed pie in sight.
Full of tips and tricks to ensure consistency with every making, Morgan presents logical step-by-step instructions in a way that is thorough but not patronising, straightforward but not simple. There is still an art to the making of these delicious treats, but like an experienced art gallery guide, there is a showing of the art in a way that doesn’t happen often. An appreciation of the nuances and of making the implicit explicit.
Like any cookbook, the preamble talks about the importance of the ingredients (what you get out of something is pretty much always equal to what you put it) and, yes, there was a commitment of some time, as with anything that is worthwhile. However, the range of recipes did mean that after ironing out a few of the kinks in the process, there is a framework within which even basic cooks can use again and again.
Overall, this is a cracker of a book that explains and explores the avenues of cooking pies to absolute perfection. It’s one for the record books. And one for every aspiring chef’s bookshelf.
Reviewer: Chris Reed
Bateman Books