Rutherglen’s Parker Pies Cleans Up at the Great Australian Meat Pie Competition

12 MEDALS FROM 12 ENTRIES

Rutherglen’s Parker Pies ‘scooped the pool’ on Thursday at the Great Aussie Meat Pie Competition in Melbourne. The awards, held every year, are a celebration of the pie maker’s art and include a wide range of categories including beef, chicken, seafood and vegetarian.  With over 2,000 entries from Australia-wide in all categories, the awards are seen as the ‘Jimmy Watson’ of pies and are highly coveted.

In this year’s competition, Parker Pies entered 12 different varieties of pies that yielded 7 Gold Medals and 5 Silver Medals.  Fred Parker commented “That’s a 100% strike rate.  It’s a fantastic result and it’s reassuring to know that the judges think that we make a great product, because that’s what our customers tell us.”

Fred Parker of Parker Pies said he felt “extremely happy and proud” to have won the awards.  Two of the pies to take out Gold included the Crikey Croc, which is a mixture of crocodile, crab meet and sweet chilli sauce and the Jackeroo.  Mr Parker said that “The Jackeroo has been a perennial favourite with customers and is a tantalising mixture of tender chunks of kangaroo and mushrooms, with a red currant jelly and caramelized onion sauce encased in a home-made golden pastry.”

Parker Pies is now the most awarded Bakehouse in Victoria, having won over 125 awards at the Great Aussie Meat Pie Competition.  

Mr Parker was very pleased with the response from the Rutherglen community who were “very congratulatory and that always feels good coming from locals”.  He went on to say that “This award is a confirmation that Rutherglen is not just a great wine destination, but also a region with great food that can compliment the extensive range of table wines and fortifieds in the area.  We use wine in a number of our pies, but only wine from the Rutherglen region.  We also try to source as much local produce as we possibly can.”

Locals and visitors alike can look forward to sampling the Jackeroo and Crikey Croc which are only available from Parker Pies in Rutherglen, along with other prize winners including the Lambtastic and the Bugs Bunny.  Mr Parker stated that his ultimate goal was “to win the best pie in Australia for all of the award categories.  This might take a while to achieve but I certainly won’t die wondering.”