It’s half meat and veg, half baked apple … and 100% delicious!
Vegetarian Miner's Pasties are also available, they were known as Tiddy Oggies.
These pasties were eaten by the Miners on a daily basis at Central Deborah.
What’s the story behind them, you ask?
Miners couldn’t come to the surface to wash their hands for lunch, they stayed underground for the length of their shift. As a result, the miner’s wives came up with the Tiddy Oggie which had a big thick crust. The miners held onto the crust with their dirty hands and ate the tasty savoury and sweet treat during their lunchbreak. They would then throw away the dirty crust and get back to work.
This was important in order to avoid ingesting dangerous chemicals such as arsenic which might have been on their hands from loading the rock into the ore trucks.
How it got the name Tiddy Oggie …
Tiddy is the Cornish/Devon vernacular for potato (along with ‘tatty’).
We’re not sure about Oggy, but these are some of the theories about its origins …
In Devonport 'Oggy' was a slang term for a pasty, derived from its Cornish name, ‘hoggan’.
Tin-miners' wives or pasty sellers supposedly shouted: "Oggy Oggy Oggy" – the response from any hungry miner or labourer would be: “Oi!, Oi!, Oi!”.
The chant is also the chorus of a folk song and has always been heard at Cornish rugby matches, so this seems another possible origin.
… and doesn’t it sound very much like another chant we know much closer to home!
Aussie, Aussie, Aussie!
Oi, Oi, Oi!
How you can get your hands on one ...
They are available for purchase within our Gift Shop.
