Celebrate Cornish Pasty Week

Ciao amico! I am getting very excited as it is the first ever Cornish Pasty Week this week. That's right you heard correctly, Cornwall's national dish is being celebrated for a whole week. What's even better is that our Cornwall Holiday Parks are opening just in time for you to come along and enjoy the highlight of the celebrations, the 'Oggy Oscars', which is the 7th annual world pasty championship held at the Eden Project this Saturday (3rd March).

As well as being a wonderfully tasty dish, the Cornish Pasty is also worth £300 million to the Cornwall economy, which is 20% of the total food and drink revenue for all of Cornwall. Did you know over 120 million Cornish Pasties are made every year and sent all around the world. Fantastico!

My mamma would have me make a Calzone, but since I've been staying at the holiday parks in Cornwall, I've become very fond of the region's favourite food. Here are my top tips for a delicious traditional Cornish Pasty.

Make your shortcrust pastry using strong bread flour to create extra strength in the gluten to hold all of that delizioso filling. To be a proper Cornish Pasty, it must contain a minimum of 12.5% meat (I use beef skirt as it will cook in about the same time as the vegetables and produces a wonderful gravy). For the vegetables I use a mixture of diced swede and potato (a waxy potato like Maris Piper is best) plus some sliced onion. Use a plate to roll your pastry out into a circle and  add all of the raw ingredients. Season with salt and pepper (about 2:1 ratio). Fold the pastry over and crimp the edges to hold it together (use your index finger and thumb to twist the edge of the pastry over to form a crimp.) Glaze your pasty with egg and put in the oven at a low temperature (about 165 degrees) and bake for 50-55 minutes until golden.

There's still time to book your holiday to Cornwall and be at the seventh World Pasty Championships run by the Cornish Pasty Association. There's a brilliant line-up of live music throughout the day. This year the event will be headlined by Britpop legends Dodgy, with support from Cornish acts 3 Daft Monkeys, Hedluv + Passman, Jamie Yost, Matthew Gordon Price and The Countrymen. In addition, there will be hands-on pasty workshops run by the Cornish Pasty Association and kids craft workshops. And, of course, you'll be able to admire the entries to the Championships in the Pasty Pageant. So come along and join us for stupefacente day! #pastysmile