Sweet Envy pastry chef Alistair Wise puts the fun back into baking
There's a mannequin named Emily leaning up against a powder blue wall. She's the colour of American cheddar and wearing modesty tape across her bust. Standing next to her, faded knuckle tattoos covered in viscous red syrup, is pastry anarchist Alistair Wise holding a huge, murderous-looking sundae in a golden cup he's dubbed the Violet Beauregarde. It's all happening on a sleepy side street in downtown Hobart.
Why? Because there's not enough fun in the pastry world, and more people should "join the anarchy".
The classically trained pastry chef cut his teeth with Michael Lambie at Circa the Prince, made waves in London and received critical acclaim from the New York Times and the New Yorker working for Gordon Ramsay. He's one of the finest pastry chefs in the country, having worked for 20 years cracking eggs (roughly 780,000 give or take a few yolks), rolling croissants (which he calls "a f---ing beautiful thing".) and crafting beautiful sweets. Working across the globe, he's developed an accent you might describe as "Hobart geezer".
Wise hates bells, and he hates whistles even more. You're more likely to see him in an old pair of dungarees and a flat cap than you will in chef's whites with a pair of tweezers poking out of the pocket. Despite the fine dining credentials - or maybe because of them - he'd rather be working in his tiny Hobart shop, Sweet Envy, alongside his wife Teena. It's easily one of the country's best patisseries. He's definitely a reactionary. Though when it comes to cooking, he's very clear about one thing: "You can't really learn to say "f--k you" until you've learnt to do it properly."
He loves to experiment. That mannequin, which he very carefully chose for its colour, pretty much sums up his entire attitude to cooking. "I don't know why, but I'm always like 'let's go make some trouble'. I can't help myself. Everyone's so serious. Have some fun and lighten up a little bit. I don't care where you foraged it. Just bang it in yer gob."
It's that trouble streak - that love of wrecking stuff "just to see what happens" means he's constantly pushing ideas, experimenting, making mischief. What level of "splat" will there be when you throw a cake off the awning of the shop? (The answer here is a very decent amount, and his reason is "well, why not?") Can you sell chopped up macarons as sprinkles for sundaes? ("It's all they're good for. Whites are for macarons, yolks are for ice-cream, which is far more interesting to me") And is combining white chocolate and cauliflower to make an ice-cream special a good idea? ("It sucked.")
All that mucking around, that playfulness, he argues, is how good ideas happen. "You never know - you could make the next cronut. You shouldn't be afraid to just put stuff in a pan to see if it tastes good."
Just don't talk to him about cupcakes. "People say things like 'I can't believe a guy like you that worked all those places makes cupcakes for a living' and I'm like, 'well don't eat them. I didn't put a gun to your head'." Anyway, he swears, cupcakes are for kids. Not that that doesn't mean each one isn't perfectly crafted, the frosting cored all the way through so every bite is the perfect ratio of cake to icing. But you won't catch him talking about that. He's all about effortless gliding on top, furious paddling below.
The thing is, he likes food that's cooked from memories, not from hydrocolloids. He'd rather take inspiration from Roald Dahl and Beatrix Potter over the techno-wizzbangery of Willy Wonka. He likes the Humphrey Slocombe guys, Dan Lepard ("total legend") and Christina Tosi. Not because he wants to cook like her, but because he likes the way she thinks, and the way she makes things from her childhood. "I love what she does. Anyone can make something super-complicated. That's not very difficult. But a good story is better."
His shop isn't just a thing of beauty, it's a place of sticky, shiny, exciting deliciousness. Pecan sticky buns are covered in thick caramel, ice-cream hot dogs are served on soft brioche buns. Wagon wheels, tim tams and polly waffles all get pimped up, and sweet-filled tart shells wear soft floppy crepes like fancy hats. He makes savouries, too: pies with buttery delicate pastry filled with anything from bacon and eggs and cauliflower cheese to pork neck and fish. Wise is ever in search of the perfect burger.
The apple of his eye, the feather in his cap, the thigh in his garter, though, is Big Bessie. That's his bottle green Commer Karrier ice-cream truck that he and his wife reconditioned. When she's not parked by Sweet Envy, Big Bessie does the festival rounds, belting out "heathen" soft-serve sundaes. "I kind of like that serial-killer-come-ice-cream-seller thing, you know? It tickles my fancy. I don't know why, but it does."
Take the Breaking Bad: soft-serve covered in a mountain of crushed up bits of sugary pie and blue sherbet. "The best thing about that one is it's got so much powder blue colouring in there that when people have braces it gets stuck in their teeth. Awesome. And they've got a blue smile for the rest of the day. As soon as you see 'em and they come up and they've got braces on, you go 'Breaking Bad. Best one, mate'. And they buy it, and you just go 'well, my work is done'."
Violet Beauregarde Sundae
Vanilla sponge
2 eggs
175g castor sugar
120ml milk
60g butter
125g all-purpose flour
5g baking powder
Pinch of salt
½ vanilla pod, scraped
Pre-heat the oven to 170C and line and grease a 20cm cake tin.
Over a pot of simmering water, whisk the yolks and sugar in a bowl until they reach a temperature of 50C or when you put your finger in it feels hot.
Transfer the egg mixture to a stand mixer and whisk until light and fluffy. Melt the butter and milk together with the vanilla to warm it to about 75C.
Fold the flour into the egg mixture and then add a third of the batter to the milk and butter combo and beat vigorously, add the two mixtures together and fold, pour into cake tin and bake 20 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.
Leave in the tin for five minutes before turning out onto cooling rack.
Before entering the sponge into the sundae fraternity, soak it in booze to within an inch of its structural integrity. I choose gin.
Sherbet
½ tsp citric acid
½ tsp tartaric acid
½ tsp bicarbonate soda
120g icing sugar
50g jelly crystals
Place all ingredients in a blender and whizz to evenly distribute. If you do not have a blender, pass the mixture through a fine sieve a few times.
Goat's milk and tahini ice-cream
300ml goat's milk
200ml cream
5 egg yolks
120g castor sugar
1 tsp tahini
1 tsp honey
½ vanilla pod split and scraped
Put the cream, milk, tahini, honey and vanilla pod and seeds into a saucepan and heat gently to 80C. Remove from the heat and leave to infuse for 30 minutes.
Mix the egg yolks and castor sugar together, but do not over aerate. Add the egg mixture to the ice-cream mixture and stir until you reach 83C. Pass the ice-cream mixture through a fine sieve into a bowl over ice.
Once the ice-cream has chilled, churn in your ice-cream machine as per the manufacturer's instructions.
Mulberry Compote
250g mulberries (or blueberries)
100g castor sugar
Place a saucepan over medium heat and pour in the sugar, using a spoon, stir to make a light caramel, add the berries and cool until needed.
600ml whipped cream
To assemble (in Wise's words): First it's a sundae, sundaes are about excess, feel it.
Put whipped cream in the bottom of 6-8 coupes/cups/glasses so it makes a bed for the fabulousness that will fall on its shoulders. This also stops the sundae from slipping around while giving some real good spoon-digging action. From there mound with ice-cream, cut the sponge, doused in gin, in any odd shape and plonk on top, spoon on some compote and then as a piece de resistance sprinkle with sherbet.
Serves 6-8
Alistair Wise will be part of the all star line-up at Sweetfest - a celebration of all things iced, baked, creamed and colourful and just one of a series of amazing feature events at The Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Month presented by Citi which runs October 1-October 31. sydney.goodfoodmonth.com.
WHERE: aMBUSH Gallery, Level 3, 28 Broadway, Central Park, Chippendale
WHEN: October 17-18; Session One 9am-1pm; Session Two 2pm-6pm
COST: $20 includes masterclasses and a glass of Redbank Emily Brut Cuvee.
Myffy Rigby is the former editor of the Good Food Guide.