There is no finer food than the humble country town pie. Really. You drive along in what seems like the middle of nowhere but is actually a thriving rural community, peering out the window for sustenance on the 10-hour drive between Sydney and Melbourne, or wherever and wherever, and slow to a stop outside a country bakery, mouth watering, the sign out front crying ‘Home of Australia’s Best Pie!’
And while you know that most of the time that’s a blatant lie, half the pies in this country make that call, maybe this time their pie truly is the best, do you have to be so cynical all the time? And if it’s not, just go for a fair shake of the sauce bottle and smother it in tomato sauce and she’ll be right.
Well, you can now rest knowing the truth: you can bite into Australia’s Best Pie at Country Cob Bakery in Kyneton, 90 kilometres northwest of Melbourne.
And that pie is a Seafood Satay Pie, created by chef Chan Kun, which according to Honey, he says doesn’t even need sauce. Sure, some might consider such a pie sacrilege, but WAKE UP SHEEPLE.
We could debate amongst ourselves what is truly the best pie filling all day and all of the night – it’s actually steak and mushroom, I will not be moved on this – but the Baking Association of Australia have done the work for us.
Aside from taking out the top prize, Country Cob Bakery really brought home the pastry in the competition, held on the Gold Coast, winning in the categories of Plain Mince Beef Pie, Flavoured Beef Pie, Vego Pie and Seafood Pie.
Khun was understandably proud of his entry: “Our pastry is very good, not too thick, not too thin. A flaky top and crunchy on the bottom,” he told The Herald Sun. “The satay seafood has lots of spice, some sweetness and that peanut butter feel to the filling.”
The Baking Association also dubbed Adelaide‘s Orange Spot Bakery‘s Three-Pepper Pastie as Australia’s Best Pastie.
Let’s clear this up before we go further here: we’re defining a pasty, as per the chairman of the British Pie Awards, Matthew O’Callaghan, “as a singular, folded pastry case with a crimped lid and a savoury filling; while pies have a base and sides and a separate lid“.
Orange Spot won for both the categories of Traditional and Gourmet Pastie, while Country Cob took the top spot again for their Vego Pastie.
A bloody incredible effort from both bakeries. And from the judges, who tasted more than 1700 pasties from bakeries all over Australia over the course of three days late last week. That’s an outstanding commitment to pie.
