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There’s a delicious Aussie food icon that deserves way more appreciation than it's previously been given.
It’s a lot quieter than your local pub and just as culturally significant as your local Chinese restaurant. It's your local bakery.
So raise your coffee cup, a pastry and tiny packet of tomato sauce because it's time to honour the great Aussie bakery (cue canned applause)!
Every Australian town has a bakery and every bakery shares a similar lineup of beloved treats. We all have a bakery favourite (or dislike) - even celebrity cooks like Adam Liaw and Poh Ling Yeow.
I hate sausage rolls! Except for the ones that I make…Poh Ling Yeow.
During the new SBS series, Adam Liaw declares his love of bakery-made sausage rolls.
Poh, however, is not a fan. “I hate sausage rolls!” Poh says. “Except for the ones that I make…I usually go for a chunky meat pie or mushroom and chunky beef pie.”
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Around the world in vanilla slice
What's cooking at your local bakery?
Here’s a list of classic staples sold at most bakeries across Australia. Whether you love or loathe these iconic baked items, their role in Aussie food culture is undeniable and deserving of celebration.
Vanilla slice
Ignore the vanilla slice’s Aussie nickname: ‘snot block’. It’s actually an elegant sweet that has roots in French cuisine, bearing similarities to France’s mille-feuille.
Credit: Adam & Poh's Great Australian Bites
Nothing beats the gooey goodness contained in a custard tart.
The Aussie classic is a close relative of the English, Portuguese, French and Chinese egg tarts. Putting all arguments aside as to which version tastes best, we simply acknowledge the special place the tart has in our local bakery window.
Jam and cream lamingtons Credit: Jiwon Kim
Lamington
If you hear talk about the lamington hailing from New Zealand, you can correct the claim and state the true origin of the lamington: between 1896 and 1901.
Since its invention, lamingtons have become as ‘Aussie’ as a kangaroo. There’s even a National Lamington Day, July 21, where we're all supposed to take time out to eat the dessert. Who wouldn't be up for that?
This classic pastry has been around for longer than you might think. Credit: Alan Benson
Neenish tart
You can spot a Neenish tart by its short crust pastry base and two-colour icing top.
were first created by a woman named Ruby Neenish in 1913. As the story goes, Neenish was baking tarts for an event when she ran out of cocoa. So she iced half of the tops with chocolate and the other half with white icing. A famed Aussie treat was born, which became known as the ‘Neenish’ tart.
Cheese and bacon rolls
Eaten cold or warmed in the bakery microwave, cheese and bacon rolls come topped with crispy bacon pieces and melted golden cheese.
Over the years, this bakery item has become so popular in Australia’s food culture that cheese and bacon rolls are also now sold at supermarket bakeries.
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Meat pie
Meat pies
were introduced to England by the Romans and then commonly sold by medieval street vendors . The British then brought the savoury meal to Australia more than a century ago. Today, the bakery favourite has a variety of flavours, from steak and kidney to Mexican mince and chunky beef.
The meat pie remains a top contender for the title of Australia’s national dish.
Credit: Adam Liaw
Sausage rolls
Aussie sausage rolls are another English adaption. Popular in London in the early 1800s, sausage rolls were sold as a cheap street food to people who were struggling to afford meat.
Sausage rolls soon made their way across to Australia with early British settlers and have been enjoyed as an Aussie snack - served with tomato sauce - ever since.
