How nice is pie?
The appeal of good old-fashioned apple pie has never waned. Across the board - from McDonald's to La Tante Claire - restaurants offer apple pie on their dessert menu.
People who eat out may have more sophisticated tastes these days, but the mouth-watering combination of slightly tart apples and sweet pastry means apple pie continues to be a firm favourite.
Earlier this month, Caterer & Hotelkeeper staged an apple pie taste test at Foxhills Golf and Country Club, Ottershaw, Surrey. For six tasters, it provided the opportunity to check out product availability, taste and cost of a range of ready-made apple pies.
The pies were served hot according to manufacturers' instructions. All products were tested blind, with detailed questionnaires filled in as each pie was tried. A separate section for novelty pies allowed some more unusual products to be checked out as well.
What makes the ideal apple pie?
The following criteria were used:
Visual impression: home-made appearance.
Texture: was the base soggy; the filling crunchy?
Flavour: did the apples taste natural; was the pie artificially sweet; did it contain the right amount of filling?
Overall quality: bearing in mind the price per serving, size, and value for money, tasters were asked if they would serve it in their establishments.
Top of the pops
One product excelled in the taste test. The fresh Bramley apple pie from Waldron's Patisserie was voted overall favourite by the panel.
Large apple pie and caramel apple squares from Aulds Foods; apple pie from Vittles Patisserie; apple torte from Coppenrath and Wiese; and toffee apple pie from Larderfresh were all recommended by the tasters.
Pitfalls
The panel discussed the pitfalls of trying to make a commercial apple pie with a home-made taste and appearance. They agreed manufacturers needed to concentrate on producing a straightforward apple pie with tasty pastry and filling, rather than one with a conflict of flavour and textures.
The testers agreed their ideal apple pie was not pre-portioned, had sweet pastry, plenty of apples and no fancy trimmings on top.
The tasters
Phil Scott is sous chef at Foxhills Golf and Country Club, Ottershaw, Surrey, host to the taste test. Foxhills averages 400 covers per day in its three restaurants: the 70-seat Manor restaurant, 70-seat Summerhouse, and 140-seat Clubhouse.
Customer profile is high-income, company business with an average spend of £20 in the Manor restaurant excluding wine. Average pudding spend is £5 where the pudding is home-made.
Desserts are bought in for both the Summerhouse and Clubhouse.
Kevin Clark, head chef, currently buys Brake Bros's deep Belgian apple pie. He is looking for desserts with a home-made appearance, good taste, and a portion cost of up to £2.
Charmayne Beard owns the Garden Centre Coffee Shop Catering Service in Higham, Kent, a 30-seat café in a small, privately owned nursery. The seasonal nature of the garden centre means she may serve anything from one to 200 covers daily. Customers snacking in the café tend to be family groups. Spend per person is between 65p and £10.
Beard also operates a catering business for weddings, business and private functions. She currently serves home-made desserts, but is looking to source a product comparable to her own.
She has not found suppliers prepared to meet her order as they considered it too small. She attended the taste test to source a pie with an even finish, home-made appeal, real apple pieces, and generous pastry. She also wanted to check out suppliers.
Dean El-Taher is catering manager for Sutcliffe Catering at London's Lambeth YMCA, where political asylum seekers and refugees from north-east Africa and South America form his customer base. He operates one 140-seat dining area, which averages 250-300 covers per day.
Although he caters for multi-ethnic tastes, traditional English puddings are popular. His budget for breakfast, lunch and dinner is £1 per person. He has a budget of 25p for bought-in desserts.
Chefs at the unit are encouraged to make fresh desserts, but El-Taher occasionally buys products from Pullman and Booker.
At the taste test, he was on the look-out for a "not excessively sweet", deep-dish apple pie, costing between 15 and 25p per portion.
Gillian Rowson is house manager at Abbeyfield, a Hertfordshire home for the elderly run by a charity which operates similar establishments throughout the UK. Currently she caters for 28 people, including 13 staff.
At present, she uses a mix of home-made and bought-in desserts. With a budget of £20 per person per week to cover breakfast, lunch and dinner, she is looking for an apple pie with a home-made appearance and not too thick a crust, "as older folk can't bite it properly". Cost-wise, her budget runs to 25p per portion. The taste test will allow her to try a good selection of products on the market.
Michael Casey is senior chef de partie at Quaglino's restaurant, London, where an average 1,000 covers are served daily. Average spend per person at the restaurant is £50 including wine. Customers spend up to £6 on pudding.
With nine pastry chefs in the 65-strong brigade, it is unlikely desserts would be bought in, says Casey. Nevertheless, he is looking to see what is available on the market.
His ideal apple pie has a light, golden-coloured pastry, and is filled with sliced apples, with a contrast between the apples' tartness and the pastry's melt-in-the-mouth sweetness.
Paul Spencer is fresh-produce purchasing consultant to eight Methodist Guild holiday hotels with a turnover of £3m. He also has responsibility for local Scouts and church group catering in Watford, Hertfordshire.
The restaurants in each hotel average 50 covers per day. Average spend totals £10, with £2.50 on pudding. Spencer is looking to source an apple pie for the group that looks and tastes good, has quality pastry and costs between 25p and 50p.
Additional research by Isabel Shuttleworth
and Diane Lane.
