The thing about this pie is, its as much an egg custard tart as it is a salty honey pie. The honey doesn’t stand alone in this tart and is, in my opinion, far from the one and only cool cat at the pie party. When I first lay my eyes on the original Four and Twenty Blackbirds pie, and then Joy’s adaptation (sorry guys, I hope you don’t mind me squeezing in another version) and then most poignantly, Lottie and Doof’s variation, I was half expecting this pie to be a spin off of Momufuku’s crack pie. In truth, I thought the pie could be a guiltless version of the crack I tasted last December in NYC.
I was so wrong by the way; the eggy center has the slightest wobble, like the double pack of egg custard tarts perched on the counters for 60 pence in the supermarkets. The inclusion of honey gave it richness, an underlying depth that felt okay to eat for breakfast instead of a slice of honey on toast. Also, my family is big on halumi on toast with a drizzle of honey, so I guess that drew me in to the recipe too.
By now I’ve likened this thing to like, something absurd like baklava because I’m so convinced it has Mediterranean undertones (it well doesn’t). To further engrain this completely stupid concept, I added rosewater to the crust. It was okay to do this because I totally went a teaspoon too far on the salt scale - but even so, the faint hint of rose is welcome here.
I used diluted rosewater instead of the sticky pink rose syrup I’m used to drinking alongside a jug of water in Cyprus. Next time I’ll be using rose syrup instead of rose water and I’ll reduce the sugar to nuance the rosey-ness, so if you can get hold of that stuff, don’t be terrified of its garish pinkness and use it in the crust.
You are now either convinced that salt, honey and rose are a winning combo or you’ve been reading this blog for too long and have sussed out that I need to stop referring to the Mediterranean and cheap supermarket goods.