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Alright, so we're talking about the
history of the humble Aussie pie
today.

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So, meat pies are old, really old. In
fact, they pre-date the construction
of the pyramids in Egypt. They trace
their origins back to the Neolithic
period around 9,500 years before
Christ, 9,500 B.C.That's crazy!

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At that time, the ancient Egyptians
diet included basic pies, made using
oat, wheat, rye and barley and they
were filled with honey and then baked
over some hot coals. Societies
throughout history indulged heavily
in pies as they were a simple meal to
cook, let alone an incredibly tasty
one to consume.

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The Greeks later created pies using
flour water paste that was similar to
pie pastry and filled the inside with
meat. They were often fried or cooked
using hot coals just as the Egyptians
had done. The Romans adopted pies
from the Greeks and used a variety of
different meats and even seafood
including fish and lampreys, as well
as shellfish like oysters and
mussels. I don't think I'd be game
enough to have an oyster pie, though,
I tell you what.

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Like the Greeks and the Egyptians,
they created pie crusts using a
mixture of flour, oil, and water.
However, the pie cover wasn't made to
be eaten and it was instead thrown
away. As the Roman Empire expanded,
so too did the pie. In Northern
Europe. early pie chefs put their
unique spin on the pie making the
pastry with fats, like lard and
butter, in order to make the dough
stiffer to create a pie that could
stand upright. These medieval pastry
dishes were called 'coffins,' which
at the time meant a basket or a box.
So, don't freak out, they weren't
putting their dead into these coffins
and cooking them up for consumption.

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Janet Clarkson in her book 'Pie: A
Global History' describes coffins as
being 'savoury meat pies with the
crusts or pastry being tall, straight
sided with sealed on floors and
lids'. Open crust pastry, not tops or
lids, were known as 'traps'. These
pies held associated meats and source
components and were baked more like a
modern casserole with no pan. The
crust itself was the pan, its pastry
tough and inedible.

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These crusts were often made several
inches thick to withstand many hours
of baking. Some historians suggest
the tough also inedible crust was
given to the servants while the Lords
and Ladies of the house at the
contents. Unsurprisingly, these
medieval pies were a hit with
everyone, royalty and peasant alike
and became an incredibly common dish.
By the 13 hundreds in England, they
started to use the contemporary name
'pie', which was spelt either PYE or
PIE.

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The etymology of the word is unknown,
but it's thought that it may be
related to the bird called the
'magpie' today. However, at the time,
they were known as 'pies' as the word
'magpie' wasn't created until the
17th century. Possibly, this is
because both were spotted or because
the bird collects miscellaneous
articles and pies often comprised
whatever meat and vegetables could be
found by the maker.

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It was actually the French and
Italians who specialised in
redefining the pastry of the pie
taking it to a whole new level when
they realised that they could make it
flaky and tastier by new methods of
adding butter, rolling and folding
the dough. In 1440, the Paris Pastry
Guild was recognised and started to
expand their product and from this
something along the lines of the
modern-day crust was born.

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Pies were first brought to the shores
of Australia by the European settlers
and convicts on the First Fleet, in
1788. Although, previous Dutch,
French and British explorers also
likely chowed down on a few flaky
crusted pies in the comfort of their
ships whilst exploring the coast of
Australia in the 200 years earlier.
They were on the menu of Sydney's
first official banquet held to
celebrate the King's birthday in June
of 1788 and at the time pies were
usually filled with mutton and gravy,
because veggies in the new colony
were few and far between and
incredibly exy.

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By the early 19th century the streets
of colonial cities like Melbourne and
Sydney rang with the cries of roving
pie sellers, trying to earn a crust
slinging pies. Pun intended. Although
the quality wasn't always top notch,
many locals speculated as to the
contents noting the disappearance of
certain neighbourhood cats. Hygiene
wasn't squeaky clean either. Many
sellers would pierce the top of their
pies and top them up with a jug of
gravy, which was usually just salty
water.

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During the 1840s in Sydney, a bloke
named William King, who worked as a
pie seller, became famous. He was
called The Flying Pie Man due to his
bizarre ability to travel long
distances swiftly by foot between
making pies sales. One story has it
that one day he was seen selling pies
to passengers onboard the steam boat
heading to Parramatta and then he ran
the 18 miles to offer his leftover
pies to the same passengers while
they were disembarking at their
destination.

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As the railway network continued to
expand throughout the 1850s in
Australia, pies became the go-to
snack food in many refreshment rooms
that sprang up to profit from
travellers crossing the country by
train.

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In Adelaide, pies were distributed by
horse drawn carts that travelled the
streets. By the 1890, a new take on
the humble pie had made its mark on
the scene in South Australia. The pie
floater. The pie floater was an
upside down pie floating atop a
puddle of pea soup, which has
remained popular even to today where
it continues to fascinate and even
horrify those who haven't grown up
wolfing them down in Adelaide.

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The flair of creativity spread to
local bakeries and pastry shops, who
also had their specialities. In fact,
one of Australia's largest brands,
Sargeants, got its start back in
1891, when George and Charlotte
Sargent opened up a shop in Sydney
and sold pies for a penny each. Less
than 40 years later, they were among
the delicacies served up at the
public opening of Australia's first
Parliament House, in Canberra.

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It was at about this time in the
early 20th century that Americans
were starting their strange obsession
with hot dogs at baseball events,
weirdos. In fear of being called
copycats and knowing that sausages or
snags, as we call them Down Under,
were only to be had when cooked on a
barbie and that if you wanted to hit
a ball with a bat, it was done on the
cricket pitch, Australians everywhere
had an unofficial meeting and decided
'you know what? We're going to
combine meat pies and the sport of
Australian Rules football'.

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As the 20th century rolled on,
bakeries and delicatessen shops
across the continent continued to
hand make pies by the dozen. However,
industrialisation and big factories
started pumping out machine made pies
by the thousands. Four 'N Twenty Pie,
another well-known Australian brand,
started up as a small family business
in Bendigo, in 1945. Within a few
years, the business opened a factory
at the Melbourne Showgrounds, capable
of churning out a staggering 12,000
pies per hour.

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Still going strong today, these
Aussie delicacies are frozen, chucked
in trucks and sent off around the
country to be distributed through
supermarket chains like IGA, Woollies
and Coles, as well as in hot food
stores at your local footy match.

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Strangely enough, the hand-held meat
filled pies adorned with a sizeable
dressing of tomato sauce today seems
almost uniquely Australian. Our
neighbours across the ditch in New
Zealand are birds of a feather and
take part in the same pie culture as
the Aussies, although they tend to
adulterate their pies with cheese
filling as well. Eww.

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In the US, a meat pie would be placed
in a freak show, where the word pie
is reserved for sweet dessert dishes,
usually filled with fruit. See the
movie American Pie for reference. And
in the UK, if you asked a pom for a
pie, he'd probably hand you a pork
pie with a totally different type of
crust mostly served cold and in a
dish with mashed potato on the side.

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Clearly pies are a vastly popular and
versatile food sweet or savoury hot
or cold wherever you are in the world
today you're sure to stumble upon
them. Australia is no exception, and
like all other places has its unique
take on this dish. So next time you
get the chance to go to a footy match
or find yourself at some little
bakery in Outback Australia make sure
to wrap your laughing gear around a
hot meat pie. And don't forget the
dead horse a tomato sauce.