Originally published 6/23/2015.
Updated: October 20, 2025 – expanded with historical context on fish days, greens vs. root beet.
During research for large, serve-warm-or-room-temp banquet dishes, I fell in love with this meatless tart from John Murrell’s A New Booke of Cookerie (London, 1615). It’s a savory-sweet “Friday” pie—perfect for fast days—combining beet greens (i.e., chard) with apples, raisins, ginger, and a squeeze of orange.
Why “Fridayes” Pye?
In early modern England, Friday was on of the traditional "fish days" or fasting days required by the Church — meaning no flesh meat (beef, pork, lamb, etc.) could be eaten. This custom was rooted in Catholic tradition and continued well into the reigns of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, even after England’s break from Rome.
By the early 1600s, when John Murrell published A New Booke of Cookerie (1615), the observance of Friday and Lent fasts was still common across all social classes. Cooks compiled specific “Friday” or “Fish Day” sections in their books, filled with meatless dishes made from:
- Fish, eggs, dairy, and vegetables
- Pastries and pies enriched with fruit and spice instead of meat
- Almond milk, butter, and oil as substitutes for animal fats
So when Murrell labels this as a “Fridayes Pye,” he’s signaling that the recipe is appropriate for a fast day:
- It’s meatless, using greens, fruit, butter, and spice instead of animal flesh.
- It fits the pattern of “Lenten pies” — dishes made for observant days that were still elegant and flavorful.
- The ingredients (greens, raisins, orange) reflect the seasonal spring diet tied to Lent and Easter preparation.
Fish Days and Fast-Day Cookery
In early modern England, “Friday” dishes like this one belonged to the long tradition of fish days—weekly abstinences from flesh meat inherited from the medieval Church. After the Reformation these customs never disappeared; instead, Elizabeth I and her Parliament re-cast them as patriotic observances that protected England’s fishing trade. On a fish day, cooks avoided beef, pork, or fowl but freely used fish, eggs, cheese, and butter. Only during the stricter Lenten fast were all animal products forbidden, replaced by almond milk or oil. Thus Murrell’s “Fridayes Pye,” rich with greens, fruit, and spice but still containing butter, fits the ordinary fish-day table perfectly—pious enough for Friday, but indulgent compared with true Lenten fare.
Why Greens, Not Roots?
When early English cooks wrote of “beetes,” they almost always meant the leaves—what we now call Swiss chard or leaf beet. The swollen red root beet familiar today was a later development. Medieval and early-modern gardeners grew white and red beetes mainly for their greens, prized for winter hardiness and gentle sweetness. Continental varieties that emphasized the root (the forerunners of today’s beetroot) reached England in the later 17th century and did not become common until the Georgian period.
John Murrell’s instruction to “picke out the middle string, and chop them small” clearly describes de-ribbing leaves rather than peeling roots. In humoral terms, greens were considered more cool and moist, balancing the hot and dry spices like ginger and pepper—making this dish suitable for Friday fasts and Lenten abstinence alike.
Original Recipe (1615)
Fridayes Pye. WAsh greene Beetes cleane, picke out the middle string, and chop them small with two or three well relisht ripe Apples. Season it with Pepper, Salt, and Ginger: then take a good handfull of Razins of the Sunne, and put all in a Coffin of fine Paste, with a piece of sweet Butter and so bake it: but before you serue it in, cut it vp, and wring in the iuyce of an Orenge, and Sugar.
— John Murrell, A New Booke of Cookerie, 1615; ed. T. Gloning
