The pasty is now popular worldwide because of the spread of Cornish miners and sailors from across Cornwall, and variations can be found in Australia, Mexico, the United States, Ulster and elsewhere.

[15] In contrast to its earlier place amongst the wealthy, during the 17th and 18th centuries, the pasty became popular with working people in Cornwall and west Devon, where tin miners and others adopted it because of its unique shape, forming a complete meal that could be carried easily and eaten without cutlery.

A couple of ounces of bacon and half a-pound of raw potatoes, both thinly sliced and slightly seasoned, will be found sufficient for the meal.

They are made of small pieces of beef, and thin slices of potato, highly peppered, and enclosed in wrappers of paste.By the late 19th century, national cookery schools began to teach their pupils to create their own version of a "Cornish pasty" that was smaller and was to be eaten as an "economical savoury nibble for polite middle-class Victorians".

Its ingredients should include beef, swede (called turnip in Cornwall),[33] potato and onion, with a light seasoning of salt and pepper, keeping a chunky texture.

[20] Producers outside Cornwall objected to the PGI award, with one saying "[EU bureaucrats could] go to hell",[36] and another that it was "protectionism for some big pasty companies to churn out a pastiche of the real iconic product".

[20] The recipe for a Cornish pasty, as defined by its protected status, includes diced or minced beef, onion, potato and swede in rough chunks along with some "light peppery" seasoning.

[18] A part-savoury, part-sweet pasty (similar to the Bedfordshire clanger) was eaten by miners in the 19th century, in the copper mines on Parys Mountain, Anglesey.

[48] Other traditional fillings have included a wide variety of locally available meats including pork, bacon, egg, rabbit, chicken, mackerel and sweet fillings such as dates, apples, jam and sweetened rice - leading to the oft-quoted joke that 'the Devil hisself was afeared to cross over into Cornwall for fear that ee'd end up in a pasty'.

[50] Another traditional meatless recipe is 'herby pie' with parsley, freshly gathered wild green herbs and chives, ramsons or leeks and a spoonful of clotted cream.

Pasties have been mentioned in multiple literary works since the 12th century Arthurian romance Erec and Enide, written by Chrétien de Troyes, in which they are eaten by characters from the area now known as Cornwall.

[73][74] In the tin mines of Devon and Cornwall, pasties were associated with "knockers", spirits said to create a knocking sound that was either supposed to indicate the location of rich veins of ore,[75] or to warn of an impending tunnel collapse.

[76] Sailors and fisherman would likewise discard a crust to appease the spirits of dead mariners, though fishermen believed that it was bad luck to take a pasty aboard ship.

A Cornish proverb, recounted in 1861, emphasised the great variety of ingredients that were used in pasties by saying that the devil would not come into Cornwall for fear of ending up as a filling in one.

The song tells of the pasty-seller with his characteristic vendor's call who was always outside Plymouth's Devonport Naval Dockyard gates late at night when the sailors were returning, and his replacement by hot dog sellers after World War II.

[80] Similarly, a giant pasty is paraded around the ground of the Cornish Pirates rugby team on St Piran's Day before it is passed over the goal posts.