Thousands of fans know these pies are worth pulling over for
Customers have waited hours for a pie from Fairlie Bakehouse – the queue has snaked out the door and down the street, with thousands of people stopping weekly at the cafe to gorge on its famous pies.
The bakery’s owner, Franz Lieber, said about 2000 pies are baked every day in the factory behind the store but, despite his success, the 63-year-old has no plans to slow down. He works long days, from 2am till 6pm, seven days a week, to prepare the plethora of baked goods – and said that after all these years the job still puts a smile on his face.
Popular pie flavours – such as the bestselling pork belly with apple sauce and crackling, and the more unusual combination of bacon and salmon – were usually created ‘‘by accident’’ and were kept on if they were a hit with the customers, he said.
On Easter Monday, last year’s busiest day, the store passed more than 3000 pies over the counter, about 200 every hour. Customers waited hours for a pie, despite staff bagging takeaway goodies as fast as possible. Lieber expected the takings for 2019 to exceed all others as it had been the ‘‘busiest year yet’’.
The premises doubled in size during 2016 but ‘‘it is never big enough … there is only so much you can produce’’, he said.
The Bakehouse was named one of the
Canterbury and Upper South Island’s fastest-growing businesses five years ago, when it had 13 fulltime and seven part-time workers.
These days, Lieber manages more than
50 employees. The Austrianborn chef previously ran Arrowtown’s bakery in the
1990s and started Fairlie Bakehouse 10 years ago after moving from Omarama to Fairlie. His next step is to open a butchery next door to sell the leftover meat fillets, something he is in the process of organising. Lieber laughed off any suggestion he held the key to business success but said using quality, locally-sourced ingredients was crucial.
Beef rumps come from Kiwi-run Silver Fern Farms, bacon from Hellers in Christchurch, salmon from Timaru or Akaroa, and he has his own pastry recipe to make sure it is ‘‘light and fluffy’’.
If you can’t make it to the Fairlie Bakehouse, between Tekapo and Timaru in the Mackenzie District, the pies are also distributed to Christchurch’s Mrs Denton’s and Service Foods, and about a dozen South Canterbury stores.
Online reviews say the pies are ‘‘sensational’’ and many claim they are the best they have ever had.
On The Road is a series on best places to eat, explore and enjoy in the South Island this summer. If you know of any other hidden gems, email reporters@press.co.nz