One of my dad’s favourite day trips when we were children was to take us across town, onto the DLR (sitting at front if poss) to Greenwich for a visit on the Cutty Sark and to walk under the Thames in the foot tunnel. The centrepiece of the day would be a visit to Goddard’s pie and mash shop, a family-run business which has been going since 1890.
You can do the whole lot and -travelcard permitting- still have change from a fiver. I get the feeling that’s why my dad loved going to Greenwich, but it’s also a straight up brilliant day out.
When Goddard’s shop was ousted to make way for a burger chain I was a little bit distraught, Goddards continued selling pies from a van and on mail order but this week they opened a new shop just a stone’s throw from the old place next to Greenwich station.
Their new shop is really beautiful and follows all the rules of a traditional pie shop, with an expansive counter, wooden bench seating and brickwork tiling. They also have some really lovely chandeliers and masses of union jack bunting, you couldn’t ask for a prettier shop.
A delicious but lethal combo of Guinness and Tia Maria the night reduced my pie-eating skills on the day, but I managed to get through most of it. I let the side down by going for gravy, any real cockney will have their pie with liquor and I wasn’t even anywhere near being able to start on a cherry pie and custard for dessert. A friend told me about a man who managed to wolf down 22 pies in one sitting, 22 pie man, I don’t know you but I salute you.
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