Pasty

Pasty

Noun / Adjective · /ˈpæs.ti/ (noun) · /ˈpeɪ.sti/ (adjective)

Definition

(Noun /ˈpæs.ti/) a baked pastry case filled with meat and vegetables, typically folded in a D-shape and crimped at the edge — the Cornish pasty being the most famous British example. (Adjective /ˈpeɪ.sti/) (of a person's complexion) unhealthily pale, pallid, and doughy-looking — she had a pasty complexion from weeks indoors.

Origin

Noun: from Old French pastée (a pastry dish), from paste (paste, pastry dough), related to Late Latin pasta. The Cornish pasty developing as a practical workers' meal — a self-contained pie that could be carried into the tin mines without utensils, the thick crimped crust acting as a handle to be discarded after eating, as miners' hands were dirty with arsenic-bearing ore. Adjective: from paste + -y (resembling), the complexion likened to the pale, doughy texture of raw pastry.