The Cornish Pasty

The Cornish pasty holds protected geographical indication status, which fixes what it is: a D shape, crimped along the curved side rather than over the top, filled with uncooked beef skirt, potato, swede and onion, seasoned generously and baked so the ingredients steam themselves inside the pastry. The swede is confusingly called turnip in Cornwall. Almost everything else is contested, including whether the thick crimp really served as a handle for tin miners with dirty hands, a story repeated everywhere and evidenced almost nowhere. What is beyond argument is that a good one is heavy, still hot enough to burn the roof of your mouth, and eaten from a paper bag standing up.

What you actually see

• The crimp - along the side, not over the top, which is the Devon version.
• Raw-filled baking - beef, potato, swede and onion cooking inside the pastry.
• Small-town bakeries - generally better than the harbour-front chains.
• The variations - lamb, vegetable and the sweet-ended pasty of older recipes.

When to go

Bakeries run year-round and a pasty is a better wet-day lunch than a summer one. Aim for the batch times, usually late morning, when they come out of the oven; by four in the afternoon the good ones have gone. Cornwall in July and August queues for everything, this included. St Piran's Day in March brings competitions.

Honest expectations

Standards vary hugely, and the pasties sold at motorway services and station kiosks under Cornish branding are a poor guide to the real thing. Seagulls on the Cornish harbours will take food out of your hand, which is not an exaggeration. They are heavy and greasy and hard to follow with anything else. Vegetarian versions are an afterthought in most bakeries.

Nearby

The Cornish coast path, the fishing harbours and the tin mining landscape inland.