Mr. Masse's Meat Pie

Recipe courtesy of Napoleon & Simone Masse

Serves 8

Mr. Masse's meat pie.pdf

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Napoleon and Simone Masse were the owners of a corner grocery store in Fargo, North Dakota where I lived until 1967. Their "house" was their small store/butchery on the first floor with their living quarters upstairs. They were both French Canadian and Mr. Masse had the most wonderful French accent. They were loved by everyone. When we moved he gave my mom one of his chopping blocks, which I am now lucky enough to have and use every day. This is their recipe for Tourtiere, a French Canadian Pork Pie. I just recently was given his recipe by Tracy Briggs, a writer for the Fargo Forum newspaper. It will now become a staple of our Christmas morning brunch. Enjoy!

Ingredients

2 TBSP of brown sugar (for pie crust)

1 small, chopped onion

1/2 tsp. each of sage, cloves, and allspice

bread crumbs to equal 1 slice*

1 1/2 pounds of lean ground port

double crust pie dough

Directions

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Combine and cook the ground pork, onion, spices and bread crumbs in a pan for 25 minutes or until no pink no longer remains. Drain off excess fat. Set aside and make your pie crust.

Make your favorite pie crust (I have pie crust recipes on this blog if you need one) but add to two tablespoons of brown sugar to the flour before combining the rest of the ingredients. Line pie pan with bottom crust. Put cooked meat mixture into pie pan and top with second crust. Crimp edges and a cut a few vent slits in top of pie. (if you using a pre-made crust, skip the brown sugar).

Bake for 15 minutes at 450 degrees, than for 5-10 minutes at 350 degrees. Cool slightly before cutting. Serve warm or room temperature.

*I used my food processor to grind up one slice of white bread.