Wellington’s love affair with the mince pie continues
Saturday, 14 February 2026
The mince pie has been part of our cultural tapestry ever since the first worker decided he needed a filling lunch of pastry and meat scraps before toiling in the fields.
However, with new foodie trends coming to the fore every day, it wouldn’t be surprising if the mince pie had taken a back seat to more healthy lunchtime staples.
But the pie has stayed. In fact, it has thrived. Salut Pies moved down from Ōtaki to Wellington due to the popularity of its product, and Puku Pies and Kai, owned by Jamie Williams, has opened three stores in Lyall Bay, Petone, and Johnsonville over the course of a year.
The pies of the modern era are a wee bit pricer than a $3 Big Ben classic steak and cheese. Often they’re priced between $8 to $12, filled with rich mixes like Gochujang pork or cauliflower mac and cheese, and have been made fresh and by hand.
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While these pies are not thermonuclear from being in the warming cabinet for 12 hours, you should probably still blow on them …
Nada Bakery owner Michael Gray has won multiple awards for his pies, including gold at last years Pie Awards for his mince and cheese.
He said the pie was the quintessential Kiwi snack on the go. The filling of a delicious casserole in various flavours plus a pastry shell means people can eat it on the run.
“Everyone has a memory about a fantastic pie they've had, whether it's been on a road trip somewhere or picking it up from a bakery as a young boy or girl, and having it in the back seat of mum [and] dad's car. Mince and cheese dripping down your face … It's sort of nostalgic,” he said.
At Nada, their most popular flavours were steak and cheese, mince and cheese, and potato top, he said. The bakery sells 400 to 500 pies a day.
Salut Pies owner Joe Player said the pie’s enduring popularity was “pretty simple” ‒ with people simply wanting good quality for a good price.
“It's fast and on the go, which more and more people these days are all about. You don't really have much time to sit around.”
Back in the day, there were only a few options. Mince and cheese or potato top were pretty much it, Player said. Now bakers could put anything they wanted into a pie.
Affordability was also a big part of it, Player added, with customers not wanting to spend too much on lunch.
“You can tell people are very specific about where they're spending their money and how much they've got per day. It's not like it used to be during every lunch, it's now, ‘I've got 20 bucks’.”
Jo’s Pies is a popular bakery in Brooklyn. Despite never having entered a competition for a national baking award, the bakery’s pies are often said to be Wellington’s most flavourful offerings, with The Spinoff judging Jo’s Homeboy pie as the capital’s best.
Large, stuffed full with a rich meaty sauce and with generous amounts of cheese inside, its not hard to understand why these pies are so popular.
(Check out The Post’s Instagram page to watch senior writer Kevin Norquay try four of Jo’s offerings ‒ including the famed Homeboy pie.)
Owner Pawanpreet Singh took over the business three years ago after original owner Jo moved back to the United Kingdom.
The two already had an relationship, as Singh had worked as the bakery manager for the New World that supplied the bakery with ingredients.
The business was doing well he said ‒ even with inflation, which had pushed some people to look at their spending and cut costs.
“Things have changed, but we’re still doing quite well.“
Pies were popular because they were an easy “grab and go,” he said, with customers only needing a spare 10 minutes to enjoy a decent lunch. Many of the bakery’s regulars drove into the suburb to eat every day.
Singh said his pies were made individually by hand ‒ not hundreds at once in a tray. His bakers stuck to the basics, he said; a decent size, and quality meat used for the fillings,
“We don't use anything frozen, yeah, and all things made here.”
With 12 to 13 kinds of flavours, new pies were cooked through the day according to demand, Singh said. The bakery easily sold 200 pies a day, and often got visitors from overseas.
Prices ranged from $8 to $9, cheaper than most pies bought in central Wellington. Singh said it was important for him to keep his food affordable, despite the cost of ingredients rising every month.
Luckily, over the past two years, he had only needed to increase costs by 50 cents, he said.
“Customers should get what they pay for,” he said.