Australia’s best pie: Rolling Pin Pies & Cakes wins crown with controversial combination

It’s a divisive flavour combo that has drawn harsh criticism from the bakery’s own manager but that didn’t stop the judges from giving it the top prize.

It’s official: Rolling Pin Pies & Cakes has taken the crown for a third year in a row, serving their customers Australia’s best pie.

In the past, the Victorian bakery has won the competition with polarising flavours like ‘Surf n Turf’ (chunky beef and prawns in a rich garlicky sauce) and ‘Breakfast’.

This year, however, they’ve created a mouth-watering combination featuring distinctive flavours to please the crowds. And, it’s vegetarian.

The bakery is well worth the trip from Melbourne. Picture: Supplied.

The Mushroom & Truffle pie was named Australia’s best pie at the 2022 Australia’s Best Pie & Pastie Competition, held by the Baking Association of Australia.

It has a creamy mushroom filling which is infused with earthy tones of truffle, and is wrapped in a golden flaky crust.

The competition is the baking industry’s only recognised national pie and pastie competition. Each year a panel of judges spend three days tasting baked goods over a number of categories, including beef, vegetarian, mushroom and gourmet.

One pie from across these categories is picked as the overall winner.

Found in Ocean Grove, Victoria, the Rolling Pin Pies & Cakes bakery also has storefronts in Queenscliff, Leopold and South Geelong in Victoria.

Rolling Pin Pies & Cakes took out the crown for the third year in a row. Picture: Supplied.

Just an hour and a half from Melbourne, the pie is absolutely worth travelling for.

If you’re not a fan of venturing into exotic territories when it comes to pies, the bakery also stocks traditional beef mince, chunky steak pies, gourmet and vegetarian options, (many of which are also award winners … they also took out the prize for best seafood pie this year with their red curry prawn pie).

Rolling Pin manager Nathan Williams told the Geelong Advertiser he believed it was the first time a vegetarian pie had taken out the national award, also revealing he was unlikely to ever eat one himself.

While the manager of Rolling Pin Pies & Cakes is chuffed with the prize, it’s not a pie he’d eat himself. Picture: Facebook.

“I dislike mushrooms with a passion,” Mr Williams said with a laugh on Friday. “When I created this pie it definitely was not for me. but I know a lot of people really love mushrooms, and in the last couple of years it was introduced into the competition as its own category – so that’s why I really wanted to get the recipe right this time, having played around with it previously.”

“We were still shocked to be given the overall award for a mushroom pie.”

This year the award for Australia’s best pastie went to Orange Spot Bakery in Glenelg, South Australia.

You can check out the full list of the 2022 winners around the country here. Why not plan an Aussie road trip and visit the ones in your state?

This post originally appeared on Escape and has been republished with permission