This is an old-school pie from New Zealand; you are not a proper mother there if you don’t pack your kids off with a bacon-and-egg pie for their sports day. I found it was also very successful on a cold, sandy bank in Scotland after the children had spent a night camping. I think their camping involved running around all night and not sleeping, starving because they had eaten all their sausages very early on, so I was “top mum” for arriving with a warm bacon-and-egg pie. It feels as if it won’t work, but it does and very easily. Peas can be added – it’s always good to get a bit of green in.

Prep time: 25 minutes

Cook time: 30 minutes

Serves: 9-12



250g streaky bacon

30g butter, plus extra for greasing

flour, for dusting

375g frozen puff pastry

2 tomatoes

9 eggs, plus 2 egg yolks

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Heat the oven to 200C/400F/gas mark 6. Put the strips of bacon on a baking tray with a few knobs of the butter. Cook in the oven for five minutes. Take the bacon out but leave the oven on.

Grease a rectangular baking tray about 30cm long with a little butter. Flour your work surface and roll out the pastry. Cut it in half, then roll out one half until it is large enough to line the baking tray. Let the pastry come halfway up the sides of the tray – this is important to prevent the egg leaking out later.

Cover the pastry with the bacon – you may need to break it into strips to make sure that the pastry is evenly covered. Slice the tomatoes and lay them over the bacon. Crack the eggs evenly on top.

Roll out the rest of the pastry and cut it into thin strips, placing it over the eggs in a lattice pattern. Beat the egg yolks with a little salt and pepper and glaze the pastry with the mixture, using a pastry brush or your fingers.

Bake for 30 minutes, until golden. Set aside to cool slightly, then cut into pieces and serve.

Margot Henderson is chef/co-owner of Rochelle Canteen, London E2