The Upper Peninsula Pasty Made it on National TV

Most people around Michigan are familiar with the famed Upper Peninsula Pasty, the British baked pastry, associated with Cornwall, South West England.

It was this past Saturday morning, Fox and Friends Weekend, on National Pastry Day, that our U.P. tradition, the Pasty, got national attention. They featured a family owned and operated bakery in Ironwood in the U.P., Rigoni's.

RIGONI'S CANNOLI

They not only got to feature their Pasty but their Cannoli as well. After all the Rigoni family is Italian so you have to have a Cannoli!

The Pasty has become a cultural symbol of the Upper Peninsula. Pasty shops are always a special tourist attraction in the U.P. Don't forget that the village of Calumet is home to an annual Pasty Festival.

CALUMET COPPER MINERS LONG RIDE DOWN INTO THE MINES IN 1906

Many ethnic groups adopted the pasty for use in the Copper Country copper mines over 100-year ago, and  now the pasty has become strongly associated with all cultures in this area.

PASTY

What, you've never had a Pasty and are wondering what the heck it is? It is typically made by placing an uncooked filling, usually meat and vegetables, in the middle of a flat shortcrust pastry circle, bringing the edges together in the middle, and crimping over the top to form a seal and then you bake it.

The main U.P. Michigan Pasty is filled with meat, rutabaga, carrots, onions and potatoes. You can, of course, swap out the filling with chicken, pork, different veggies, whatever because it's the crust that makes it so special. That is the real art of the Pasty.

If you're interested, Rigoni's ships across America, so if you can't get your Pasty fix around here, get them shipped in from the U.P. and Rigoni's!