Lincolnshire rarebit
A twist on the classic dish – why let the Welsh take all the glory, eh? And anyway, I'm from Skegness, and the Midlands deserves more recognition for its input into the nation's culinary heritage, so there! Serves six.
4 tbsp stout – Batemans is good (and it's from Wainfleet, too, so isas local as you could wish for)
5 tbsp double cream
170g Lincolnshire Poacher cheese or cheddar, grated
1 tsp ready-made English mustard – and, yes, it has to be Colman's
1 egg yolk
3 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
Salt
6 slices of your favourite bread
To make the topping, tip the stout into a pan, reduce by half, then stir in the cream, cheese, mustard, egg yolk and Worcestershire sauce, and beat well until smooth. Leave to rest, then season with seasalt to taste.
Grill or toast the bread, spread with the topping, return to the grill to brown the toppping a little, and serve, perhaps with agreen salad.
Pork pie
Well, you can't do a piece about food from the Midlands and eastern England without including arecipe for a pork pie, can you? Makes eight of Britain's finest snack.
For the filling
1kg minced pork shoulder with30% fat
Salt and pepper
2 tbsp chopped picked herbs – parsley, rosemary and thyme
For the pastry
550g plain flour
1 tsp salt
180g lard
1 large egg, beaten
Mix all the filling ingredients in alarge bowl. Take a nugget-sized piece, fry in a little oil until done, and taste. Adjust the seasoning in the rest of the mix accordingly, then leave to rest in the fridge while you get on with the pastry.
In a bowl, mix the flour and salt. In a saucepan, bring the lard and 200ml of water to a boil, then stir into the flour. Using your hands, mix together until it comes together into a smooth dough, then cut into eight.
Take one piece of dough and divide into two, with one piece twice the size of the other. With a lightly floured rolling pin, roll out the two pieces on a floured worktop. Put a decent sized ball of filling in the middle of the larger pastry disc, then place the smaller disc on top. Bring up the sides of the larger piece of pastry and pinch together with the smaller disc, to enclose. Repeat with the remaining meat and pastry, and leave the uncooked pies to rest in the fridge for half an hour.
Heat the oven to 200C/400F/gas mark 6. Brush the pies all over with beaten egg, and bake for 35 minutes. Serve warm or cold, but always with piccalilli or pickle (by the way, that's code for, "Bring out the Branston!" – Staffordshire's finest).
Lincolnshire sausage &pheasant casserole
Brown chicken stock is just normal chicken stock, strained, cooled and boiled down a bit more to reduce thewater content and make it more intensely chickeny. Serves four.
1 onion, peeled and diced
2 carrots, peeled and diced
1 swede, peeled and diced
A little vegetable oil
4 Lincolnshire sausages, roasted until just browned allover
400g tinned tomatoes
300ml brown chicken stock
400g tinned cannellini beans (or other white beans)
1 bouquet garni made with rosemary, bay, thyme and parsley
1 pheasant, jointed (ie, separated into two legs, two thighs and four roughly equal-sized pieces of breast), and browned all over
Heat the oven to 180C/350F/gas mark 4. In a large casserole pot on the stove top, roast off the diced vegetables until they've taken onsome colour. Add the sausages, tomatoes and stock, and reduce by athird. Add the beans, bouquet garni and browned pheasant pieces, pop on the lid and cook in the oven for about an hour, until everything is tender. Leave to rest for 10 minutes before serving with mash.
Bakewell pudding
Possibly Britain's most famous pudding, and a Midlands staple.
160g puff pastry (homemade orbought)
270g melted butter
1 egg, beaten
7 egg yolks
250g caster sugar
1 tbsp ground almonds
3 tbsp raspberry jam
Using a lightly dusted rolling pin onafloured work surface, roll out the pastry to 1cm thick, then prick it all over with a fork. Line a suitable-sized tart ring with the pastry, and rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.
Heat the oven to 190C/375F/gas mark 5. In a heatproof bowl, mix the butter, whole egg and yolks, sugar and almonds. Place the bowl over abain-marie of barely simmering water and stir until the mixture goes sticky. Spoon jam over the bottom of the tart case, then pour in the filling and bake for 45 minutes, until golden. Serve hot, warm or cold, with some cream, ideally clotted.
Jason Atherton is head chef at Maze, 10-13 Grosvenor Square, London W1. His book, Maze: The Cookbook, is published by Quadrille at £25. To order a copy for £23, including UK p&p, go to theguardian.com/bookshop, or call 0330 333 6846. His new book, Gourmet Food For Under A Fiver (Quadrille, £14.99), is published in April 2010.
Victoria Moore's drinks recommendations
The rarebit already has some beer in it, so I'll stick with that, ideally Batemans Dark Lord (£1.89, Morrisons; 5% abv), which is brewed locally in Wainfleet. For the pork pie, try a glass of red: Chat-en-Oeuf 2007 Cotes du Ventoux (£4.99, Waitrose; 14% abv) is smooth, fruity and really delivers for the price. It's tempting to go back to beer again on the sausage and pheasant casserole, and, indeed, back to Batemans. Marks & Spencer has just launched a new range of own-label beers, and a "buy any four, get one free" offer across the range – one of them is a Wainfleet special: Lincolnshire Best Bitter (£1.99 for 500ml; 4.9% abv) has a slightly apricotty smell and is pleasingly robust, which will be just right with the game.
