WHO ATE ALL THE PIES (VERY QUICKLY)

Look, here in the Psychogourmet Test Kitchen we are not body fascists and we’re certainly not body-shamers.  We like our pies, and we could all afford to lose a good few pounds.

So when we see (above) a picture of the winner of the World Pie Eating championship, held in Wigan earlier in December – that’s Martin Appleton-Clare who ate a chicken pie in 19.58 seconds - we’re far too accepting to question whether his vocation might be having an unacceptable effect on his body.  We know that every true champion puts his or her body through unimaginable stresses. 

To be fair, the runner up Ian Gerrard – the one above on the left - looks as though he may have suffered even more than Martin Appleton-Clare:

Compare and contrast with Sonya Thomas, of Alexandria, Virginia, AKA The Black Widow. 

She’s the winner of multiple eating contests, holder of multiple records, including eating Nathan's hot dogs,  eating five and three quarters pounds of deep fried asparagus in 10 minutes, eating 43 soft tacos in 11 minutes, and eating 65 hard boiled eggs in 6 and a half minutes.  All of these sound like very hard work and the hard boiled eggs just sound like absolute torture. 
         Even so, Sonya Thomas weighs 100 pounds and is 5 foot 5 inches tall.  Just sayin’.

A LIFE OF PIE

Well, I said that I’d be eating pies while I was in London, and I wouldn’t lie about a thing like that.  On my first day in town I ate this one (not all of it), a Brace and Dram Wild Game and Whisky Pie, from Fortnum and Mason. It took a certain amount of imagination to convince myself that I could taste the whisky.

A week or so later, again from Fortnum and Mason, I bought this one: a (ruinously expensive – best part of 9 quid - really) Mutton and Caper Pie, which I thought could have used a few more capers.

And it so happened that I was staying close to a Marks and Spencer.  Now, M and S is no Fortnum and Mason but they’re not bad, and by no means ruinously expensive, and so in those moments when I was in need of comfort I wandered in and bought items such as these Mini Melton Mowbray Pork Pies, which were perfectly good.

I also scoffed down some of these Dinky Melton Mowbray Pork Pies.  Yep, thay really call them that.  In general I don’t want my food to be “dinky” but I was prepared to make an exception here.

I suspect there is some alternative universe in which Marks and Spencer sell micro pies, or bijou pie-ettes.  I’d probably be happy to eat those too.

PIE TO THE MAX

Gotta love a woman who likes pie and haggis, and especially when she eats them together in a haggis pie.  Although it must be said that in this picture young Nicola Sturgeon does seem to be sniffing it rather than actually eating it.