I put the lard, water and salt on the stove to boil, and measured out the flour.
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Mixing the pastry.
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Being careful not to knead the pastry too much, I formed it into a ball and left it to rest for a while.
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150g of pastry for each pie, moulded over a greased jamjar (I knew that trip to Lakeland last year would prove useful). I put them in the fridge to harden up.
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Getting the cases off the jars was a problem, until I hit upon the idea of filling the jars part way with hot water and gently easing the cases off. There were a few cracks, and plastering them over with warm dough seemed a bit tricky. Would they hold when they went in the oven? I put the filling in, and mounded it over the tops.
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I patted out five circles of dough at 100g each. I thought the best course of action at this point would be to smooth the tops on to the cases, rather than crimping the edges together - I was none too optimistic that the cases would hold by this point, and I raised a 'false' rim around the edge of the tops. It's normal to eggwash at this stage, but I erred on the side of caution and got them straight in the oven. I eggwashed after half and hour, and lo and behold, they held. The cases firmed up nicely and even after only half and hour's cooking, they felt quite robust.