DEATH IN THE PIE.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 7720, 18 April 1887, Page 2

DEATH IN THE PIE.

The recent death of three Maoris, and the narrow escape of several Europeans after eating a moat pie in an Auckland clergyman's house, has not unnaturally caused great excitement in Auckland, and there are many letters in the papers on the subject. Two of these are worth reproducing for the information of housewives, Dr. A. 0. Pnrchna writes to the Herald:— "As I have seeti and treated many similar cases arising from the eating of meat pies, I think it right to say that I feel Ratisfied that some of the meat having been finned had nothing whatever to do with it. The fact is that if a pio bo made with perfectly fresjj meat, and set asido to cool slowly, a nojson may be formed in the gravy, and so give rise to attacks of choleric vomiting and dlari'hcoa, sometimes of great severity ; but if an opening

is made in the crust, so that the cooling may lake place quickly, no such effect is likely to follow, learned this by painful experience in our own family many years ago, and I am confident as to tho truth of what I 'have stated. It used to be our custom, always to have a cold dinner on the Sunday, to les'sffii domestic labor on that daj, and we repeatedly observed that when the meat whs put into a pie, thoso who partook of it- suffered in tho manner described; but as soon as we adopted the plan of always leaving a vent in the crust, we had no more poisonous pies." Dr. NYilkins corroborates this, saying, "It is a pity such terms have been so frequently used

in the different journals as. 'A death from eating tinned meat,' ' Another death from eating ■ tinned meat,' when, it is quite certain that tinned meat, in the .sense in which the term has been applied, was not the immediate cause of death in either case, as the same result would probably have occurred had there been no tinned meat in the pie. It is not generally known that any meat pie, beef, veal,- mutton, or chicken and ham is most dangerous when baked with a thick crust, in which no holes have been made for the free escape of the mephitic gases, which are mostly generated during the baking of the pie, and which poisonous gases become thoroughly impregnated with the meat and gravy of (he pie if not allowed free vent by several holes being made in the crust before the baking

process becins ; which holes a good cook invariably'makes, and an inexperienced one most usually omits. Several cases have come under my notice where the same choleraic symptoms have resulted after eating meat-pies, which were all traceable to the same cause— viz., no vent had been made in the crust whilst the

pies were being baked. . The symptoms, too, are nearly always alike in all these cases— violent pains, vomiting, diarrhoea, with most rapid prostration of strength. The fault in the present unfortunate instances is not immediately attachable to the tinned meat, nor to the beef of which

the pie consisted, but to tlis cook, I expect, who was either ignorant that such holes should be made in the crust before

baking, or that she made them so carelessly that they became stopped. Not long since seven people in England were on the verge of death from eating veal pie from the same cause—viz., want of vent in the .ctust. Believing in the wholesomeness and soundness of New Zealand tinned meat for food, I am willing to eat of a pie made of tinned meat which had been once, twice, or thrice cooked, providing, of course, the proper vent holes had been made in the crust; but nothing would induce me to partake of a pie made of. any kind of meat— beef, veal, mutton, or chickenwhere the proper crust ventilation had been previously omitted." Careful housewives will make a note of this for future guidance. No new discovery is contained in tho letters of Drs. Purclias and Wilkins, but very many people are still unaware of the danger of making "close" meat pies.