Great NZ Hot Cross Bun Competition winner

Press release

19 March 2015

Changing Up to Win

Christchurch bakery Kidds Cakes has won the Great New Zealand Hot Cross Bun Competition for the second time in three years, and they put their success down to small but significant changes to their recipe. BIANZ president Michael Gray visited the bakery to hand over the trophy in person to father and son team Martin and Chad Meehan. The bakery also wins a pallet of flour from Farmers Mill.

Martin says tastes have changed over the years and they keep pace by continuing to develop and tweak their baked products while still maintaining trusted baking traditions. “We change our recipe a little every year and do a lot of test baking” says Martin. “Cloves were popular at one time in hot cross buns, but preferences have gone away from that clove base because it’s quite heavy. The taste now is for something lighter and more citrusy. We put lemon zest in our buns to give the other flavours a lift,” Martin says.

Working out just what to adjust is a long slow process. “It takes a lot of work to get the spices balanced. You have to think about where the spices you use are from and whether they are fresh. We make our own blend. We use a variety of fruit, including a few cranberries. You have to treat the fruit first, hydrate it just right. If it’s too dry it sucks the moisture out of the bun. If it’s too wet it gets shredded in the dough.” The buns are all hand finished to ensure they are perfect when they go into the oven.

Competition chief judge Mike Meaclem says Kidds Cakes buns’ bold appearance and citrus flavour as well as the even distribution of fruit throughout the buns was a winning combination.

The Kidds Cakes team made 600 buns on competition day, and chose the best batch of six to send in. Martin sees value in competitions not only for the winner but for everyone. “Competitions generate product awareness. It doesn’t just benefit us. We enter a lot of competitions and we lose more than we win, but still see ourselves as winning every time we enter because we work on a product and look at how we can improve it. It gives you motivation and it’s good for the staff.”

Kidds Cakes makes only one kind of hot cross bun, no chocolate hot cross buns here, and they start making them just before Easter and then stop at Easter. Martin is a firm believer in seasonality. “Seasonal products get good prices and they’re enjoyable because they’re limited. Hot cross buns fit into a wee window before winter sets in and it’s a buzz making a lot of something for a short while in the bakery.”

While Kidds Cakes begins by making about 300 buns a day leading up to Easter, this amount increases until they are producing more than 6000 a day, and more now that they’ve won the Great New Zealand Hot Cross Bun Competition. After taking pre-paid orders they make twice as many buns again for sale on the day.

The other top five finalists in the competition were U-Bake in Timaru, Nada Bakery in Wellington, Kapiti Cakes in Paraparaumu, Ten O'Clock Cookie Company in Masterton, and Taste Of Europe Bakery in Lower Hutt.

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