An Unfortunate Incident...
...or The Phantom, The Food Waggon and The Very Messy Pie...
I have lost count of the number of you lovely people who have been telling me that Goddards Pies have managed to survive, despite being bought out of their lovely old shop by The Gourmet Burger people. I can understand their doing it and though selling pies out of a van could be seen as a step down, they are at least still going.
I was determined to try them out again before writing about it, and it's taken me all this time (a good few months) to get round to it. Time seems to be very short just now.
So. There we were, hungry, and in the tiny food-courty bit sandwiched by the bank and the railway line in Greenwich Church Street. A perfect opportunity to test Goddards at last.
They still do much the same range as before - all the old favourites (including rhubarb crumble, hooray.) And they're still as jolly and friendly as ever. We bought a selection, found ourselves a bench at the back (interestingly, although it was a Saturday, lunchtime, heaving outside and not tipping with rain there was loads of space) and dug in.
And yes, the stuff's pretty much the same as ever. With one exception. It's all ridiculously hot. I guess they have to keep it piping and you do have to eat it with your fingers these days instead of with a knife and fork, but this is something else.
It was all going pretty well until I bit into the cheese and onion pie. Now - I know I didn't have too many of them back in the days of the shop, but was it really just a sort of searing-hot goo in the olden times? This was like a cheesy version of instant mash potato when it's been made up with too much water.
I'll give you tasty. The actual flavour wasn't bad at at all. But it started to seep, then rain scorching spud all over me. I'd taken a paper napkin, so I was able to mop up as I went along, but once I'd got past the pastry, it all collapsed, covering me with red- hot (and very wet) potato.
Apart from the incredible pain, it was the shame that got me. A Phantom with red-hot potato smarmed all over their mush is not a pretty sight. Trouble was, by this time my napkin was already covered with cheesy pie innards, so the more I dabbed at the goo dribbling down my chin, the more I covered the rest of my face. It went on my nose, my cheeks, my lips - everywhere. My companions found it extremely amusing until they realised that my face was burning underneath. They got me more paper tissues and I cleaned up. It took about half an hour for the red marks to die down.
So. Here's my advice. By all means go to Goddards. And enjoy the lovely meaty/fruity/cheesy pies. Enjoy the friendly banter. But take lots of paper napkins and wear old clothes. Carrying some soothing ointment as a precaution may not go amiss.
I have lost count of the number of you lovely people who have been telling me that Goddards Pies have managed to survive, despite being bought out of their lovely old shop by The Gourmet Burger people. I can understand their doing it and though selling pies out of a van could be seen as a step down, they are at least still going.
I was determined to try them out again before writing about it, and it's taken me all this time (a good few months) to get round to it. Time seems to be very short just now.
So. There we were, hungry, and in the tiny food-courty bit sandwiched by the bank and the railway line in Greenwich Church Street. A perfect opportunity to test Goddards at last.
They still do much the same range as before - all the old favourites (including rhubarb crumble, hooray.) And they're still as jolly and friendly as ever. We bought a selection, found ourselves a bench at the back (interestingly, although it was a Saturday, lunchtime, heaving outside and not tipping with rain there was loads of space) and dug in.
And yes, the stuff's pretty much the same as ever. With one exception. It's all ridiculously hot. I guess they have to keep it piping and you do have to eat it with your fingers these days instead of with a knife and fork, but this is something else.
It was all going pretty well until I bit into the cheese and onion pie. Now - I know I didn't have too many of them back in the days of the shop, but was it really just a sort of searing-hot goo in the olden times? This was like a cheesy version of instant mash potato when it's been made up with too much water.
I'll give you tasty. The actual flavour wasn't bad at at all. But it started to seep, then rain scorching spud all over me. I'd taken a paper napkin, so I was able to mop up as I went along, but once I'd got past the pastry, it all collapsed, covering me with red- hot (and very wet) potato.
Apart from the incredible pain, it was the shame that got me. A Phantom with red-hot potato smarmed all over their mush is not a pretty sight. Trouble was, by this time my napkin was already covered with cheesy pie innards, so the more I dabbed at the goo dribbling down my chin, the more I covered the rest of my face. It went on my nose, my cheeks, my lips - everywhere. My companions found it extremely amusing until they realised that my face was burning underneath. They got me more paper tissues and I cleaned up. It took about half an hour for the red marks to die down.
So. Here's my advice. By all means go to Goddards. And enjoy the lovely meaty/fruity/cheesy pies. Enjoy the friendly banter. But take lots of paper napkins and wear old clothes. Carrying some soothing ointment as a precaution may not go amiss.
Labels: Cafes, Eating Out, Food and Drink
posted by The Greenwich Phantom at
08:54
7 Comments:
I always carry a spork with me for just such occasions. If it's good enough for eating Jacket Spuds I would think it's ideal for a Pie or two.....or three....etc, etc.
Now, how to get my hands on a Rhubarb Crumble.........
Hmmmm - does anyone know the exact story regarding Goddards selling out to GBK? I have to say - not knowing all the facts - that it always left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth. The shop was going to be knocked down to make way for the DLR/shopping arcade, Tony Banks came and had lunch there and isted it on the spot because of the 18th Century staircase, and they gotr English Heriatge money to refurbish and refit. Everybody's really pleased - a great Greenwich institution has been saved, hat's off to Tony and the Goddard brothers. But then along comes an offer they can't refuse, they sell out, and instead of a 100 year old pie and mash shop, which is a real part of the character of central Greenwich (and always busy, so not llosing money) we get a slightly more upmarket version of Macdonalds.
I don't know all the facts, but I was pretty sure that the family owned the property freehold, so why did they sell a successful business, unless GBK made them an offer they couldn't refuse?
If the above is unfair and there's things I don't know which justify them selling out, I'll be the first to apologise, but that's how it's always seemed to me.
Does anyone know?
Incidentally Clapham House who own GKB have been in trouble of late, the shares have lost 70% of their value in the past year, and there is talk of some of its resturant chains being sold off.
Yeah, know what anonymous means - taking the money and running after all the support (including financial) they got for preserving the old shop always seemed a bit crap to me too, but I don't know all the facts either. On the face of it, it was rubbish behavior, frankly.......
However. The salient point here is that pies, unlike the other London working class staples such as fish and chips, jellied eels, whelks, cockles etc, were never ever eaten in the street with the fingers. If you can't sit down and have your pie proper, with mash and lashings of liquor, sorry, but it just ain't right.
On both of the above counts, their pie stall won't be getting my custom, especially since I can walk to Deptford in ten minutes and get the proper plateful before adjourning to the Dog and Bell for a couple of pints of first rate beer.
I'm a bit confused Phantom... Why didn't you just get a knife and fork from them? I had a yummy pie and mash from them a couple of weeks ago and was given cultery!
They have flatware?
D'oh!
Yup, I wrote in in support of Goddards, and was overjoyed when the place was refurbished. But what an empty victory THAT turned out to be, when their 100 years of family history turned out to be for sale, as long as it was for the right price.
To compound the crime, we took the nipper to GBK recently, not wanting to be curmudgeonly. Not interested in the overpriced burgers, one of us went for the Moroccan chicken salad. Bad move, if you don't want to spend the early morning with your head down the toilet.
Still, if the GBK group went bust, and Goddards bought the building back at a huge discount, we'd all be happy, no?
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