When Broadsheet speaks to Banana Boogie Bakery owner Jason Spencer, it’s his 15th consecutive hour on the job. He’s been up since 1am making sausage rolls – and he couldn’t be happier about it.
Banana Boogie Bakery, the Belair bakery Spencer and his wife, Kelly Spencer, have operated since 2015, last week took out the title of Australia’s best sausage roll at the Baking Association of Australia’s South Australian competition.
Since getting the gong, the pastries have been (sorry) rolling out the door. “There’s been a line up out the door every day since we opened on Monday,” Spencer tells Broadsheet. “[We’ve probably sold] 3000 sausage rolls over the last three or four days.” (Pre-award, he says, the bakery typically sold five or six hundred a week.)
So, what is it that takes a sausage roll from servo staple to something going on gourmet? According to Spencer, it’s the pastry. Banana Boogie’s sauso roll is encased in a “really buttery, melt in your mouth” house-made puff pastry that left judges impressed. Spencer also shares some credit for the win with Luke from Blackwood Butchers. “[Luke’s] been really pivotal. You have to get the right amount of fat in the meat and the right amount of sausage,” Spencer says. “We worked together in the week leading up, and two days before the competition we found that we got the perfect mix. He’s absolutely over the moon.”
This is not Banana Boogie’s first brush with fame. Earlier in the year it scored an award for its meat pies and pasties, and in March its hot cross buns were named the country’s best.
In more news from the cut-throat world of competitive baking, Spencer announced Banana Boogie’s intention to take out the much sought-after title of Australia’s best vanilla slice. (It is already the SA state champion.) “I’m excited for the vanilla-slice comp in a couple of weeks,” says Spencer. “[We want to] take out a clean sweep of all the national competitions.” Watch this (well-buttered) space.
