Yooper Pasties

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My grandparents (slovenian) started out in the iron ore area of Minnesota and she made these for him when he worked in the mine.
She taught me to make them when we visited with her.
Her crust was much like that listed above (like a pie crust, a little thicker) and she'd put in a little sugar in the dough, she said it helped them brown better.
We'd assemble cubes of venison, potatoes, onions (chopped), infidel-carrots :LOL: and rutabagas in a big bowl, make the crust, rolled in a circle, fill with raw ingredients, sprinkle with S&P and top with a slice of butter before folding the crust in half edge to edge and sealing the edges, then baking.
It's still one of my favorite things to eat. Ketchup, no gravy--that was our traditional way.
 
sparrowgrass said:
Oh--in my part of Minnesota, REAL pasties are made with cubed beef (or venison), some ground beef suet, and cubed potatoes and rutabaga (beggies). I don't remember any onions, but some infidels do put carrots in them.

A friend of mine is Cornish, and he says when his granny made them, she waited til the crust was just browned, cut an X in the top, and poured cream over the filling. Put them back in the oven and cook til the cream bubbles.

My Minnesota friends ate them with ketchup.

Pasty making is a popular fundraiser for churches--the ladies all gather and make hundreds of them, and people buy them by the dozen. They do freeze well.

I find them rather flavorless--I prefer a nice southern chicken pot pie with lots of gravy.
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Then it's a good thing she asked about Yooper pasties, and not Minnesota pasties, jk. ;) Imho, carrots and oinions make the pasty. I grew up a little deeper into the UP, but I worked a couple summers in St. Ignace, the southern gate to Yooper country. Of course signs for pasties speckled the scenery. We always had trolls i.e. folks from the lower peninsula (they live below the Mackinac Bridge) and other tourists stopping in and asking what a "pay-stee" was. I always wanted to tell them it was an adhesive patch that certain women use to strategically cover as little as legally necessary. I probably would have gotten in trouble though, so I gently corrected their pronunciation (pass-tee) and explained exactly what Blissful described and to try them with ketchup and a big glass of at least 2%, if not whole milk. They are not for the calorie-conscious, but they're worth it occasionally!
 
We have a Pasty shop near my parents cabin that we frequent and fill the freezer so I've never tried making my own but this thread is proving inspiring! DH eats them plain but I use ketchup and we both love ones with potatoes, rutabagas, onions and carrots! As a side note, if you are ever in WI visiting the capitol in Madison, there is a Pasty restaurant (hole in the wall really) about 2 blocks away that is to die for. They have about 12 types of Pasties hot and ready and you buy them by the 1/2 or whole. Delicious!
 
A little pizza place in my home town served "Pizza Pasties." They were really just a large pizza crust topped, folded in half, and baked. They were amazing. The place is now under new ownership no longer serves them. I've tried calzones and the like from other places, but they're just not the same...
 
Does anyone still put suet in their pasties. My mom used to use it ... sure tasted good!
 
Suet? - Pure beef or mutton fat collected from around the kidneys!?

I don't make mince meat pie from the old fashioned recipes.

It's about 850 calories per 3.5 oz. which is too high for me to consider using for anything more than mixing with seed and feeding to the birds.
 
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I suspect that some folks do still use suet but these days it's not pc to admit that you use animal fats. I use lard in my pie crust and I justify it because it works so much better than shortening and since I only make a few pies per year I don't think I am hurting anyone. But there are those in my aquaintance who would be horrified to hear of this practice. To each his own.
 
joesfolk said:
I suspect that some folks do still use suet but these days it's not pc to admit that you use animal fats. I use lard in my pie crust and I justify it because it works so much better than shortening and since I only make a few pies per year I don't think I am hurting anyone. But there are those in my aquaintance who would be horrified to hear of this practice. To each his own.
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I use lard too. I know what it is (I have rendered fat into lard myself). It has fewer weird chemicals. It's reasonably low in trans fats. And, of course, it works really well.
 
joesfolk said:
I suspect that some folks do still use suet but these days it's not pc to admit that you use animal fats. I use lard in my pie crust and I justify it because it works so much better than shortening and since I only make a few pies per year I don't think I am hurting anyone. But there are those in my aquaintance who would be horrified to hear of this practice. To each his own.
Click to expand...

A friend of mine and I go to the store twice a year and blithely buy pounds of lard for our Tamales. If people don't like it, they don't have to eat them. But, we never seem to get anyone who turns them down.:)
 
Suet and lard are two different things entirely. Suet comes from around either beef or mutton kidneys. It's not just ordinary fat, whereas lard is rendered pork fat... a different critter and process.

I use lard for making pie crusts too, although fortunately for my weight, 4 out of 5 pies I bake end up on someone elses table.
 
I think our Latin American friends are much more accepting of meat fat as a general rule. Frankly I would rather use lard than say something that I consider more artificial like margarine. Give me a pound of butter anytime!
 
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