Cornish Pasty
Cornish Pasty is a traditionl round or oval pie, made of wheat or wheat-rye flour. It can be stuffed with beef, pork or chicken and vegetables, such as carrots, potatoes, cabbage. Usually Cornish Pasty is seasoned with spices and greenery, including parsley and parsnip. They can also cook this kind of pies with fruits, for example with apples. Actually, there are dozens of varieties of Cornish Pasty, differing from each other in dough, filling or shape.
Cornish Pasty is a traditional dish for the south-western regions of England, mainly Cornwall. This kind of pies considered to be a distinctive feature of local food, although sellin this kind of tasty and nutritious food has spread throughout England at present. Cornish Pasty can be purchased for a very modest fee (from 50 pence to 2 pounds) in a variety of specialty pastries from York in the north of the country to Windsor in the south. In addition, this type of hot snacks can be bought now in many countries outside the United Kingdom, from Australia to Mexico.
Under the official version, Cornish Pasty was a meal-lunch for the Cornish mines who mined tin in local mines in the Middle Ages. These pies were baked by miners' wives. Miners had no opportunity to was their hands in mines, and they threw away the crust of the pie to protect themselves from harmful metal. So the legend was born that the pie crusts were left for underground gnomes to appease them.
At the same time, the author of the "Official Encyclopedia of Cornish Pasty" Les Merton argues that the recipy of Cornish Pasty had been passed from generation to generation for the last 10 thousend years, soit can be said that the recipe dates back to the beginning of times.