Where Can I Buy Authentic British Pies in the United States?

A British pie isn’t simply meat wrapped in pastry. There are regional favourites, family recipes and plenty of opinions about what belongs inside one.

But a really good one has a few things going for it.

Get those things right and you have something sturdy, comforting and enormously satisfying.

Get them wrong and, well... you know.

Savoury pies simply aren't part of everyday American food culture in quite the same way they are back home.

Then there are the recipes, techniques and flavours. British pies have their own character: deeply savoury fillings, familiar seasonings, good gravy and pastry that is every bit as important as what's inside it.

For a Brit living in America, finding something called a meat pie isn't particularly difficult.

Finding one that actually tastes like home is another matter.

Right here at Parker’s Great British Institution in Buffalo, New York.

And we're not simply importing frozen pies from Britain.

We make them ourselves here in Buffalo.

Our pies are handmade using British recipes, British seasoning blends and the flavours we grew up with, before being frozen and packed for their journey to customers across America.

It means you can get the kind of British pies you remember without waiting for your next flight across the Atlantic.

There is, of course, no correct answer.

But we can certainly make choosing a little easier.

If you've ever eaten a traditional British pork pie, you'll know its pastry is quite different from the pastry surrounding a hot meat pie.

That's hot water crust pastry.

It's sturdy, savoury and designed to hold its shape around the filling, giving a traditional pork pie its unmistakable freestanding structure.

It's why you can pick up a pork pie, slice it for a Ploughman's lunch or put it on a picnic plate without the whole thing collapsing into a tragic pastry incident.

Ask ten Brits and you'll probably get ten slightly different answers.

A hot Steak & Ale or Chicken & Mushroom Pie is very happy alongside creamy mash, chips, garden peas or mushy peas, preferably with enough gravy to require careful plate management.

A pork pie is a different affair entirely.

Eat it cold with mustard, Branston Pickle or piccalilli, add a chunk of good cheese and you've got the beginnings of a very respectable Ploughman's.

And yes, eating a hot pie straight from the foil because you couldn't be bothered making the sides is also perfectly acceptable.

For many of our customers, a British pie isn't simply something to put on the dinner table.

It's the pie from the local butcher. Saturday lunch. Something hot after the football. Mum's dinner with mash and peas. A pork pie at Christmas. The sort of everyday food you don't realise you're going to miss until you're thousands of miles away from it.

That's a big part of why we make them.

They're here. Handmade in Buffalo, by people who know exactly what a British pie is supposed to taste like.