This Jane Austen blog brings Jane Austen, her novels, and the Regency Period alive through food, dress, social customs, and other 19th C. historical details related to this topic.

Street Pie Men

Whenever Jane Austen came to visit London, her ears would have been assaulted by the din of London street noise. This would include the distinctive cries in the evening from street vendors such as the pie men shouting, “Pies all ‘ot! eel, beef, or mutton pies! Penny pies, all ‘ot–all ‘ot!”

In 1851, Henry Mayhew published London Labor and the London Poor, Vol 1. This social history described the venerable but humble occupation of the ‘street pie men’ and ‘the street-sellers of pea-soup and hot eels.’ These pie men sold their hot food to poor working class families at an affordable price. At one time, over 600 pie men roamed London to sell meat, eel or fruit pies in streets, taverns, summer fairs and at the races. By the time of Henry Mayhew’s history, only about 50 remained, selling their pies from 6 (in the evening, I presume) and staying out all night. The best time for selling pies was between 10 p.m. and 1 a.m.

Cornish Pastry

Eel sellers, however, largely sold their wares from stalls. Around the mid-19th century, these two trades went into a decline when penny-pie shops were established. Some street pie men did not seal off their pies properly, whereas the new shops sold food that was generally safe. Instead of selling pre-made pies, they sold live eels or food with good nutritional value for families to take home and cook. Within a few years the street sellers had almost disappeared.

Read more about this topic in the following links, especially Henry Mayhew’s. He interviewed actual working pie men and wrote down their observations:

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For anyone who wants to taste the American version: the southern Wisconsin town of Mineral Point http://www.mineralpoint.com has preserved the stone cottages built by early 19th-century Cornish immigrantshttp://www.wisconsinhistory.org/pendarvis/. The area still has strong ties to Cornish culture and restaurants serve traditional Cornish food. They were the best Cornish pasties I’ve ever had.

It is a nice tourist town — known for it antiques — that has a lot of information about the early mining history including these “fun facts”: 1. the pasties are wrapped this way so that they can be tucked under their jackets and keep them warm during the cold mornings in the mines before they are eaten at lunch; 2. one can still see “badger holes” dug into the hills for surface ore and — for the poorest of the miners — for shelter; 3. calling the immigrant Cornish miners “badgers” started out as a slur but, as is common, they turned it into a term of distinction and it is the origin of Wisconsin’s nickname, the “Badger State” as well as the state University’s mascot, Bucky Badger.

Moving up a century in history (from Jane Austen to Jay Gatsby): if you make a trip to Mineral Point be sure to also visit Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesen in Spring Green.

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Hello, my name is Vic and I live in Richmond, VA. I work in program and professional development at Virginia Commonwealth University, and I have adored Jane Austen almost all of my life. I am a proud lifetime member of the Jane Austen Society of North America. This blog is a personal blog written and edited by me. I do not accept any form of cash advertising, sponsorship, or paid topic insertions. However, I do accept and keep books, DVDs and CDs to review.

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Irresistible Attraction

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My Regency Tea Cup Review Ratings

Five Regency tea cups: The book is not perfect (few books are), but it was well worth its purchase and possesses many outstanding qualities that makes it stand head and shoulders above its counterparts.

Four Regency tea cups: This book offered many hours of pleasant reading, and I found I could not put it down.

Three Regency tea cups: Damned with faint praise. I put the book down often, but was intrigued enough to finish it. In this instance, the movie might be better.

Two Regency tea cups: This book required major changes that the author and editor should have fixed before publishing deadline.

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