Our Bedfordshire clanger recipe sticks to the traditional way of making pastry and combining classic flavors. One end is savory, while the other is sweet!
Bedfordshire clanger
Aunt Kate described this dish as the closest thing to the
Cornish Pasty her Dah used to take with him each day for lunch while he worked
in either the fields or in the mines depending on the time of year. When she was done making these I would scarf
up at least two of them before I was full. My father used to each 2 or three and then ask how many he could take home for another day's lunch. Aunt Kate would
laugh and send us home with all but 3 that were left. Those were her lunches
for the next few days.
This delightful pastry combines savory and sweet, with ham
and potato on one side and apple cinnamon on the other.
Aunt Kate used to encourage me to practice this recipe once
I got home and I did. She suggested I try other combinations besides her
suggestions in both meats and sweets to help enhance the pasty.
Ingredients
1 small Pork hind leg joint
2 bottles of Apple cider
1 Bay leaf
1 sage leaves
2 apples
1 white onion, finely sliced
1/8 cup of butter (for onions)
¼ teaspoon salt (for onions)
1 ½ tsp brown sugar (for onions)
3 apples, peeled and quartered
3 tbsp brown sugar
3 ½ tablespoons of melted butter
¼ Lemon, juice
1 tsp cinnamon
2/3 tablespoons of Dijon mustard
Pastry
3 ¼ cups plain flour
2 eggs, one for glazing
¾ teaspoons of salt
½ cup of water
3/8 cup suet or vegetable shortening
3 ½ tablespoons of butter, chilled and grated
Place the gammon in a deep pan with the cider, bay leaf, and
sage, so that the liquid is covering the joint. Put on a medium heat. Bring to
a slow simmer and cook for 3 hours. Once cooked cut into bite-sized pieces.
Place the butter in a frying pan and wait until it
becomes frothy. Add the onions with a little bit of salt and cook until
translucent. Once cooked through add the brown sugar and continue to cook on low to medium heat until they are golden brown and caramelized. Turn off the
heat and allow the onions to cool at room temperature.
Place the apples in a frying pan with the melted butter and
the lemon juice and cook until soft on the outside but still hard in the center.
Add the sugar and the cinnamon and leave to cool.
Place the peeled and chopped potatoes into salted water and
parboil. Then leave to cool.
For the pastry, sieve the flour and salt into a bowl. Add
the suet and the butter and rub in with your fingertips until you have a
breadcrumb-like consistency. Add in the water and one egg and bring together.
Once formed, make the pastry into a flat circle, clingfilm, and place in the
fridge to chill (if you’re in a rush place the pastry in the freezer).
Preheat the oven to 350f degrees.
Once chilled roll out the pastry, 2mm thin, and cut 10cm by
15cm.
Like when making a sausage roll, you only want the filling
to cover one half (length-ways) of your pastry, so that you have enough pastry
to bring over the top to cover everything neatly.
For a Bedfordshire clanger, you want the Savory filling to
fill 2/3rd of the space and the sweet side to fill the remaining third. Place a
thin wall of pastry at the two-third point to prevent leakage between the two
sides when you add the fillings.
For the Savory side, first place a thin layer of Dijon
mustard on the pastry, then pile the gammon, caramelized onions, and potatoes on
top.
For the sweet side place the apples with some of the juices.
Egg wash around the three sides and pull the remaining
pastry over the top and seal. Egg-wash the top of the clanger and place in the
fridge for 10.
Take the clanger out of the fridge, slash three times on
each side, sprinkle with brown sugar on the sweet end and salt on the Savory, and bake for 30 minutes or until golden brown.
Elizabeth Kilbride is a Writer and Editor with forty years of
experience in writing with 12 of those years in the online content sphere.
Author of 5 books and a Graduate with an Associate of Arts from Phoenix
University in Business Management, then a degree. Mass Communication and Cyber
Analysis from Phoenix University, then on to Walden University for her master’s
in criminology with emphasis on Cybercrime and Identity Theft and is currently
studying for her Ph.D. degree in Criminology. Her work portfolio includes
coverage of politics, current affairs, elections, history, and true crime.
Elizabeth is also a gourmet cook, life coach, and avid artist in her spare
time, proficient in watercolor, acrylic, oil, pen and ink, Gouche, and pastels.
As a political operative having worked on over 300 campaigns during her career,
Elizabeth has turned many life events into books and movie scripts while using
history to weave interesting storylines. She also runs 7 blogs that range from
art to life coaching, to food, to writing, Gardening, and opinion or history
pieces each week.
British Fare,
Potpourri of Frugality. Kilbride
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