Harry and the Queen send pies sky-high

by Michael Gormly
Sydneysiders, it seems, like nothing better than a big boat and a pie floater. The arrival of the Queen Mary II last week at Garden Island drew crowds all day and night. Once they had seen the boat many queued up to try a pie from Harry’s Café de Wheels, a feature of the Woolloomooloo waterfront since 1945.

About 2,500 pies went down the hatch, mostly with mashed potato, peas and gravy. That’s about double the normal turnover, said Harry’s owner Michael Hannah. Hot dogs were also in demand but pies ruled the day.

‘It might not sound like much but we were flat out keeping up with the demand in such a small space,’ he said.

A steady supply of pies had to be delivered from the Pyrmont bakery all day, difficult when Cowper Wharf Road was a special-event clearway lined with fleets of buses loading Queen passengers who had only a day to see Sydney.

Once delivered, each pie needed 40 minutes heating before it could be served.

‘We really concentrate on getting the temperature right,’ said Mr Hannah. ‘People might say, well, it’s only pies but you’re only as good as your last game. If the food isn’t good people won’t come back.’

That’s been his motto for the 25 years he has owned the famous pie van. Harry’s then served Sargents Pies until the supplier went out of business before being relaunched in 1989. In the meantime Harry’s stocked McKay & Boys pies until they also folded and Michael Hannah couldn’t find a suitable replacement. So he decided to start making the pies himself.

He started in an empty café in Liverpool Street, using second-hand mixers and hand-stabbing the pies with a fork.

‘I had to learn it from scratch,’ he said, ‘remembering things my mum told me like never put a hot filling into cold pastry.’

As the Harry’s empire expanded with a cart in Hay Street and an outlet in Newcastle operating out of a refurbished tram, it soon outgrew the small bakery. Next came bigger premises in Surry Hills near the Shakespeare Hotel and now a purpose-built plant in Ultimo next to the Powerhouse Museum does the job.

Along the way Mr Hannah learnt the trade, gleaning information from an ex-Sargents worker, buying up some of the original machinery from the Sargents factory and finding that normal frankfurts didn’t cut the mustard in a hot-dog. He switched to continental franks and is now developing his own ‘absolute best’ German-Vienna sausage.

He even uses whole salt in his recipes because it contains trace minerals like iodine and potassium that get stripped from normal table salt leaving only sodium chloride and anti-caking agent.

Mr Hannah sold the Chinatown and Newcastle Café de Wheels but continues to supply all three outlets from the Ultimo bakery.