The secret behind the Balfours frog cake smile

Beady eyed smiling vivid-green frog cakes, tarts filled with wobbly natural custard, giant choc-topped doughnuts, and square pies. Ah, let the good memories flow — but it wasn’t always the case for Balfours.

Sharon Lithgow has been working for Balfours for 34 years. Picture Dean Martin

• Iconic SA Balfours sold but will stay in South Australian hands
• Balfours’ frog cakes are still a bestseller despite rise in price

Beady eyed smiling vivid-green frog cakes, tarts filled with wobbly natural custard, giant choc-topped doughnuts, and square pies … ah, let the food memories flow.

Be it recollections of tuckshop lunch, dressed up for a trip to town and cafe stop with grandma, or a quick snack in a bag in the back seat on a family drive, they are the heart of this South Australian story that is, you guessed it, all about Balfours.

The research and writing of a new book about this family company has yielded many surprises, not least that the jolly frogs are still entirely handmade, and the custard tarts are “real”.

Balfours, now in the steady hands of SA family firm San Remo, gathered a team comprising a historian, photo researcher, and journalist – that’s me – to tell its turbulent tale.

The company steeped in the family’s Christian ethics has made a litany of decisions, good and bad, that have transported it into the essence of SA.

It’s a story “intertwined” with SA, says spokesman Erik de Roos.

“For our 165-year anniversary we wanted to share our story in a memorable way.” The book is a gift to the state, he says, coinciding with South Australia’s History Festival, and a month of celebrations from next Saturday.

Few are aware that Balfours survived a roller-coaster ride straddling three centuries; that it can be traced to 1852 when one Scottish artisan baker who was bound for Melbourne in the Gold Rush years chose Adelaide instead; or, that it was a locavore pioneer of buying local, and using seasonal ingredients.

Early Balfours delivery vehicle car outside the bakery.

A 1931 advertisement promised fresh cakes made from South Australian flour, eggs, butter and fruits, by South Australian artisans.

More pioneering attitude was seen as early as 1930, when hygiene became policy, thanks to obsessive Gordon “Mr Clean” Balfour.

And, in the late 1800s, Elizabeth Balfour, a woman of enormous substance, brought the cafe and tearoom concept to Adelaide. Elizabeth, who’d borne six children, bolstered the company, and later saved it.

As competition increased, loyal bakers in the fold created new products to give the bakery an edge. Some of those ideas have stuck.

Belinda Hanson-Kenny was a Balfours product development manager from the late ’90s.

In a climate of demand for more cost-effective baking, frozen goods and the extended shelf life, she was a staunch advocate for the “proper” custard tart, and instrumental in keeping it “real”.

Her pure-food ethos won out. The tart is still “traditional all the way”, filled with a fresh baked egg custard.

“It was the last thing baked, and came hot out of the oven about 8-9pm,” says Belinda, now an independent food scientist at Food. Labelling & Safety.

“If you were working late, you were one of the privileged few who could have a tart straight from the oven. It’s delicious warm or cold.”

Balfours Cafe in Adelaide during the 1940s.

The famous frog cake is another stayer, still handmade at the Dudley Park Bakery by a team of pastry cooks led by Sharron Lithgow.

Every creamy “head” is slashed, by hand, with a hot knife to form the “mouth”, and the two tiny black eyes are piped by hand, to complete the cute froggy face.

The frog cakes now also come in chocolate, pink, and bite-size.

The time-consuming happy frog laugh, achieved by a precise 70-degree angle cut, by hand, has become a straight smile.

But Sharron says the big grin made a comeback for Valentine’s Day this year and was so well received she believes “the wide smile will return in the near future”.

Balfours was also famously involved in the revival of the Pie Cart, in 1987.

Sharon Lithgow has been working for Balfours for 34 years. Picture Dean Martin

Revellers were the new audience, downing Balfours square pies swimming in pea soup and sauce from 6pm to 5am.

Longtime Balfours baker-turned-manager Dean Evans, who had worked for the company since the mid-1950s, decided the ageing cart should be rejuvenated to mirror Adelaide’s famous Red Hen rail carriages.

“A Lonsdale caravan builder did it for us,” he says. The cart’s fame swelled.

“Everyone who came to Adelaide would head to the casino for a pie floater – no matter how famous,” he says, ticking off memories of Billy Connolly, Joe Cocker, and local politicians who “did the floater”.

He’s personally more partial to a custard tart, but the cart was his pet project, and “it should always have a place in the city. Bring it back”.

Christian ethics were ever present in Balfours’ business dealings. While upholding the morals at times proved a challenge, especially through the “greed is good” ’80s, they fostered resounding respect.

The “happy place to work” was revered, says Dean. “You were proud to work there.”

Food technologist Ross Collins admired the teamwork, but also remembers the days when State Bank troubles were jeopardising highly geared companies, including Balfours, then run by the Wauchopes.

“The family had its 51-52 per cent, and then the good Lord told David Wauchope, a born-again Christian, that he should hold 100 per cent, and he borrowed heavily,” he says.

The bank (that collapsed in 1991) foreclosed, sending Balfours into a spin of management changes until it was acquired by San Remo in 2008.

Yet at grassroots level, Balfours has arguably rarely missed a step. Staff tell of the family and Board’s generous support. Even in the Great Depression the needy congregated behind the cafes or factory, knowing they’d be fed, and, regular deliveries of pies and cakes to the Salvos continued through the toughest times.

In the case of Michael Hane, a SA Sports Institute scholarship in 1995 led him to work in the Balfours Bakery cafe. The 21-year-old 800m runner needed flexible work hours. Balfours looked after him.

“Sponsorship was so hard to find,” he says. “When I went overseas with the Australian (track & field) team, the cafe just gave me $2000. It was a gift. No strings.”

He says he offered to promote Balfours, “but they said it wasn’t necessary, just that ‘we’re happy to support you’”.

“For 10 years they were good to me. I was determined to stay on at least another 10 years. I’m still here,” he says.

The Balfours Story (Newstyle Media) is compiled by Dianne Mattsson, historian Jan O’Connell and photo researcher Fred Harden.

It is free, and initially available at Balfours, City Cross and Marion.