Cambodian makes NZ best pies

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atst
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Cambodian makes NZ best pies

Post by atst »

Choose your cheese wisely: tips from the baker who makes NZ's best pie

More than 4000 entries from nearly 500 bakers are being judged in the 2021 NZ Supreme Pie of the Year competition.
Sopheap Long​ credits the Covid-19 lockdown for her rapid ascent from top apprentice to baker of New Zealand’s best pie in two years.

On Tuesday night, Long became the first woman in the Bakels New Zealand Supreme Pie Awards’ 25-year history to win the top gong, beating out more than 4000 other entries with her steak and cheese pie.

“I am just so proud of myself,” the 36-year-old said on Wednesday morning down the line from Euro Patisserie in Auckland’s Torbay.

Bakels NZ Supreme Award winner Sopheap Long and her husband, Bunna Hout, with the Supreme Pie Award trophy.

Bakels NZ Supreme Award winner Sopheap Long and her husband, Bunna Hout, with the Supreme Pie Award trophy.
“We have reached the target now. Best pie in New Zealand!”

* This is New Zealand's best pie - and for the first time in awards history, a woman baked it
* Who rates all the pies? We lift the lid on how NZ's best pie is chosen
* Our state pieways: New Zealand's best small town bakeries to stop at

There was no celebratory sleep-in for Long, who arrived at the bakery about 4am on Wednesday, following three or four hours’ kip, to start baking for the day.

Usually Euro Patisserie sold about 400 pies per day, she said, but she was anticipating much higher demand following her big win – customers had already been requesting the steak and cheese from the moment the doors opened at 6am.

Sopheap Long's Supreme Award-winning steak and cheese pie.

Sopheap Long's Supreme Award-winning steak and cheese pie.
Long moved to New Zealand from her native Cambodia in 2000 and began working at the bakery, owned by her aunt, originally in the front of house.

Over the next couple of decades Long had three daughters, now aged 15, 14, and 9, and also developed an interest in what was going on in the kitchen.

She was named apprentice pie maker of the year in 2019 but said she did not really have an opportunity to hone her craft until New Zealand went into level 4 lockdown in March 2020.

“The bakery is seven days a week and during the pandemic [we] got a four-week break,” she said.

Long did a lot of baking during lockdown – hot cross buns and pizzas were also on high rotation, and her daughters were “very good tasters” – but one focus was perfecting the steak and cheese pie, Euro Patisserie’s top-selling flavour and what Long described as “the Kiwi favourite”.

So what are the secrets to New Zealand’s best pie?

Use the right type of cheese, for a start. Long favours tasty cheese, because “when you eat a steak and cheese pie, you really want to feel the cheese”.

Bakels NZ Supreme Pie Award winner Sopheap Long with, from left, husband Bunna Hout, celebrity chef judge Peter Gordon, NZ Bakels managing director Brent Kersel and MC Dai Henwood.

Bakels NZ Supreme Pie Award winner Sopheap Long with, from left, husband Bunna Hout, celebrity chef judge Peter Gordon, NZ Bakels managing director Brent Kersel and MC Dai Henwood.
Unlike some other types, tasty cheese did not melt into the gravy too much, leaving a distinct flavour.

The pastry was also very important: it had to be a golden brown, flaky pastry that held in the filling without going soggy.

The biggest mistake people made when baking pies, Long said, was rushing.

“Pastry needs time to rest,” she said. “When you make pastry you cannot rush.”

The same principle applied to the filling: “The meat as well has to be slow cooked. Don’t rush, just [cook] a little bit, do something else and then come back.”

Of course, if that sounds like too much, you could always leave it to the experts

https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/food ... s-best-pie
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AndyKK
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Re: Cambodian makes NZ best pies

Post by AndyKK »

Excellent for NZ, could do with a few more pie makers in Cambo. Is there much call for good stake pies in Phnom Penh? I had one the other night, calling at the Pub in street 174, for a hot takeaway meat and mushroom. Very tasty.
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atst
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Re: Cambodian makes NZ best pies

Post by atst »

The small bakery across the road from mum's here in nz are Cambodians as well and everything in there is excellent including the pies.
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Re: Cambodian makes NZ best pies

Post by SternAAlbifrons »

No arguments and no dispersions cast... But
I just don't reckon asian bakers (in asia or in the west) have got the feeling for butter and lard, the heavy oils, that you need to turn out the particularly gross and satisfying style of faux French offerings that genuine Au and NZ bakeries used to produce.

(this probably applies to pasteries more than meat pies. I don't eat any of those except from a few "pie specialist" suburban bakeries.
- and i sure ain't brave enough or drunk enough to have ever tried one in Cambodia)
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TheImplication
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Re: Cambodian makes NZ best pies

Post by TheImplication »

Was expecting actual pies. Instead got some steak and cheese something or other.
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Re: Cambodian makes NZ best pies

Post by Username Taken »

TheImplication wrote: Thu Jul 29, 2021 5:58 am Was expecting actual pies. Instead got some steak and cheese something or other.
Such is the modern world we live in.

That said, I hear their avocado, chicken and mango pie is divine.
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Re: Cambodian makes NZ best pies

Post by PSD-Kiwi »

TheImplication wrote: Thu Jul 29, 2021 5:58 am Was expecting actual pies. Instead got some steak and cheese something or other.
Meat pies are real pies...not those weird pumpkin or fruit pies :stir:

Reference the OP, Cambodians have been dominating NZ's, and even Aussies, best pie competitions for years, wish some of them would move back to Cambodia and introduce Cambodia to what a real meat pie should be, nothing commercially available here even comes close .... mmmm...pies!
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Re: Cambodian makes NZ best pies

Post by mannanman »

PSD-Kiwi wrote: Thu Jul 29, 2021 1:46 pm
TheImplication wrote: Thu Jul 29, 2021 5:58 am Was expecting actual pies. Instead got some steak and cheese something or other.
Meat pies are real pies...not those weird pumpkin or fruit pies :stir:

Reference the OP, Cambodians have been dominating NZ's, and even Aussies, best pie competitions for years, wish some of them would move back to Cambodia and introduce Cambodia to what a real meat pie should be, nothing commercially available here even comes close .... mmmm...pies!
There’s a few western pie makers around, PP and a few in Kampot. Salt Bar made amazing pies but he’s finished now. Sad.
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Re: Cambodian makes NZ best pies

Post by John Bingham »

PSD-Kiwi wrote: Thu Jul 29, 2021 1:46 pm
TheImplication wrote: Thu Jul 29, 2021 5:58 am Was expecting actual pies. Instead got some steak and cheese something or other.
Meat pies are real pies...not those weird pumpkin or fruit pies :stir:
He was expecting a cherry pie.

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Re: Cambodian makes NZ best pies

Post by PSD-Kiwi »

mannanman wrote: Thu Jul 29, 2021 2:00 pm There’s a few western pie makers around, PP and a few in Kampot. Salt Bar made amazing pies but he’s finished now. Sad.
Yea, but none of which compare to a NZ bakery pie, JD's pies are probably the closest. There used to be a place in Kampot called Dandelion (or some flowery name) run by an Aussie who made great pies. Yes...I am a pie connoisseur/snob :D

P.S. fairly certain we have at least 1 pie thread a year, and it always turns into an argument with Brits trying to claim their pies are better than Kiwi pies, etc. (No competition, Kiwi pies win hands down :wink: ).
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