A Collaboration with Finer Pleasures
As a butcher, we have always wanted to do a pie. It only feels right that great butchers can produce great pies. The stumbling box for us is that we simply haven’t the space or equipment to make them. The skills and enthusiasm for a pie we have in abundance, but a suitable, working kitchen, unfortunately not. Which meant that to realise our dream of a pie we would have to team up with someone who did have the capabilities to produce one in volume. Immediately we knew who it had to be - introducing Finer Pleasures!

Finer Pleasures is the brainchild and passion project of chef Josh Whitehead. A proud Yorkshire man, Josh and Swaledale’s paths have crossed at various points in our respective journeys, notably at Ox Club in Leeds and also at The Harewood Food and Drink Project. There is a mutual reverence for each other’s work and ethos.

Josh is a self-proclaimed pie geek and fanatic and launched Finer Pleasures in 2023 as a vehicle through which to realise his dream of owning and running a pie business. He sources local meat and uses traditional pie making methods to produce pies that are truly exemplary, a love letter to the heritage of one of the country’s, and certainly the county’s, most important food cultures. In the case of this collaboration with Swaledale Butchers, we are talking about a venison and Guinness number, and it is so, so delicious.

In Josh’s Words
“This was the first pie I made as Finer Pleasures and, to me at least, is somewhat of a personification of the businesses namesake.

Venison is kind of a comfort zone for me, I adore venison. I love every breed of deer, each with their own unique idiosyncrasies and characteristics.

I’m not really sure what else needs to be said about Guinness. The black stuff, Liffey water, dannos, pint of plain, whatever you call it, its phenomenal, life affirming even.

Then there’s bone marrow. Sweet, silky, rich and deliciously savoury bone marrow. The thinking man’s foie gras. And along with the aforementioned, are indeed life’s Finer Pleasures.

Shoulder, belly, neck and shanks of a wild roe deer are first heavily caramelised in a mix of its own suet and dry aged pork fat. To avoid thickening the gravy with a heavy roux or any other starches or fats, the deer is gently braised for around 10 hours with rich and gelatinous beef tendons, as not to mask the rich flavour of the venison and it’s ever so appropriate counterparts. Bolstered with my life elixir (Henderson’s relish), a vegetable mirepoix and a bit of black treacle.

I love this pie. And I hope you love it as much as me. Best cooked in a preheated oven at 200°C for around 40-50 minutes until darkly golden brown. Allow to stand for five or ten minutes before consuming, unless you don’t much care for the roof of your mouth that is.

Best enjoyed with a blob of mash, maybe some greens and a touch, and I do mean a touch of gravy. A good bandit gravy is a couple of OXO cubes dissolved into some boiling Guinness, thickened slightly with gravy granules and a massive dollop of whole grain mustard. Mangez bien!”