Tuesday, August 07, 2007

The Most Expensive pie in the World.


A question I am often asked on the subject of wine is "generally speaking you would expect a bottle of wine costing £15.00 to taste better than a bottle of wine costing £5.00" ... well yes normally.


"So if you cook with wine, a dish made with a bottle of wine costing £15.00 should taste better than a dish made with wine costing £5.00".... erm well the answer to that one is not so easy.

In the British county of Lancashire a group of wealthy individuals challenged a local chef to serve them a dish that was utterly unique, money no object, and so this chef decided to create for them the worlds most luxurious steak and mushroom pie, how British.

Lets look at some of the items the chef had on his shopping list.



  • The best cut of Japanese Wagyu beef, famous for it's marbling and melt in the mouth texture at £500 a kilo.

  • Matsutake mushrooms sourced from China and picked under armed guard at a cost of £2000.

  • French Bleus mushrooms £13.

  • Winter black truffles £84.

  • Edible gold leaf to decorate the pastry £300.

  • 2 bottles of Mouton Rothschild 1982 at a cost of £700 a bottle, as cooking wine.
Said Chef did say that using wine that would today cost £8000 plus per case being used for nothing more than making gravy did make him wince somewhat.

The pie was cut into 8 slices and served to our wealthy individuals for £1000 per slice served with 2 Bottles Louis Roederer Cristal Rose pink champagne value £690, no doubt vegetables were included in the price. I understand the whole experience was a bit special and his clients were extremely impressed. So I have to ask would this pie have tasted any different if a couple of bottles of say St-Emilion value £8.00 been used?

See my next post for my thoughts and those of others on the subject.


"Reminds me of my safari in Africa. Somebody forgot the corkscrew and for several days we had to live on nothing but food and water". W. C. Fields.

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