Alternative Eats: Pie Society
We delve deep into Shanghai’s food underbelly to give you an alternative view of the city’s dining scene.
Alternative Eats this month comes to you hot off the press. There is a new, Englishstyle pie company in town and by the looks of things, they may just “pie off” the competition. Pie Society made their debut onto the Shanghai foodie scene by hosting a pop-up restaurant at Magnet and sold out within two and a half hours. This was shortly followed by a stand at Shanghai Tattoo’s Day Drinking event where they sold out within two hours. Jane Siesta of Pie Society claims they “just can’t make them fast enough”!
You may recognise Siesta as “DJ Siesta” who has been working as a DJ/Promoter for the past 15 years, however, her second passion in life is cooking. After living and studying in the UK, Siesta fell in love with the country’s food and the British food revival that the UK has experienced over the past ten years. You may not hear this everyday, but Siesta claims “UK food is amazing”! After having already perfected her cottage pie recipe, she set her sights on pastry encased pies, which she made for the first time two months ago. After they were so well received by her British friends, she decided it was time to expand her horizons.
The concept behind Pie Society came about from Siesta’s idea of bringing together creative, young, food lovers to eat, talk and make pies together, hoping that it would act as the catalyst for other projects spawning from their full and inspired bellies. Siesta has already met a young pie enthusiast from the UK by the name of “Butcher Farrell” with whom she will be collaborating in the future through her events, so the proof really is in the pudding, or should we say, pie!
Pie Society uses 100% free-range meat and eggs in their pies along with locally sourced vegetables to ensure the highest taste and quality for customers. As Pie Society’s pies are made in the traditional English way, a flaky, crispy, baked pastry top is essential and therefore Siesta home makes her pastry dough using the finest flour and fats. Due to the nature of pop-up events, if you get there late in the day, you will find that most flavours have sold out, however, Pie Society pies currently come in steak, mushroom and ale, steak and cheese, chicken, leek and tarragon, as well as the Homity Pie (a vegetarian option). Speciality pies are also available such as the Irish Shepherdless and Gourmet Steak and Stilton. Siesta is also always developing new flavours and is open to new suggestions for speciality pies from fellow pie worshipers.
Pie Society is so new that they are not available in stores yet, however, they have launched a website which promises to be transactional in the near feature. The pies will also be out to play for a month long stint of Sunday pop-ups in May at DAGA (36 Tai’an Lu, near Xingguo Lu. Tel: 3469 5337), where Siesta will be offering up pie and pint brunches. The menu will be designed around the drinks, sides and condiments. Siesta will also be at DAFF in June, when she will be inviting guest pie-makers to create their own versions of the pastry dish. Single pies start from RMB 30 (for the veggie version) and Pie and Pint sets with two sides come in at RMB 85 or RMB 65 without sides.
Pie Society. Tel: 138 1629 9297. Web: www.piesociety.co
