Historical recipe: Woolton pie

Published: March 17, 2022 at 1:19 PM

Difficulty 3/10

Total time: 1 hr and 30 mins

In every issue of BBC History Magazine, picture editor Sam Nott brings you a recipe from the past. In this article, we recreate a vegetarian dish was served during the Second World War

Vegetarian

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This vegetarian dish was served during the Second World War, when meat and other key ingredients were in short supply. Created at London’s Savoy Hotel, it’s named for Lord Woolton, then minister of food. Despite efforts to popularise this pie, the public – who preferred a meat filling – gave it a lukewarm reception.

Read more about Britain's WW2 war on starvation

Ingredients

For the filling

500g each potatoes, cauliflower, swede and carrot, all chopped
4 spring onions

chopped
1tsp vegetable extract or 1 stock cube
1tbsp rolled oats

For the pastry

150g wholemeal flour
75g butter

cold and chopped into cubes
8tbsp cold water

Method

step 1

For the pastry, put the flour in a mixing bowl and add the butter.
step 2

Rub the butter into the flour with your fingers until it resembles breadcrumbs.
step 3

Add the water to make a soft dough.
step 4

Refrigerate the pastry for 30 minutes, then roll it out to a size big enough to cover the top of your pie dish.
step 5

For the filling, put the vegetables, vegetable extract and rolled oats in a saucepan, add an inch or so of water and stir to avoid sticking. Cook for 10 minutes. Once cooled, transfer the mixture to a pie dish.
step 6

Cover with pastry and bake at 180°C for 40 minutes, or until the top is browned.

Historical recipe: Woolton pie

Ingredients

For the filling

For the pastry

Method

step 1

step 2

step 3

step 4

step 5

step 6

This article was first published in the March 2022 issue of BBC History Magazine