Chunk of Devon

Nothing beats a proper pasty, and that’s something Chunk has been proudly producing in Devon for 10 years. Founder Simon Bryon-Edmund has food running in his veins; “I was very much brought up in catering,” he says. “My father used to have inns before they were gastro pubs, and he was getting great recognition for his steak and kidney puddings so meat pies are part of my heritage!” Pies have long been part of Simon’s story: “I made the move from pubs to fish and chip shops, but not being able to find a decent pie to stock led to him buying “a very small, undeveloped pie company… and that was it!”

The business’s West Country heritage undoubtedly plays a part in its ethos. “”Devon runs at a slower pace than the rest of the UK,” explains Simon. “It’s not quite so rushed; people take their time and everything is paced in order to produce quality. That tumbles into things like animal welfare, and all the things that affects too. We have people we call ‘cow cuddlers’, and farmers who read books to their pigs at night; that’s the sort of thing that happens down here. As a result of that, the West Country has brought a lot of really great, cool, premium brands to the food and drink market. Something must be in the water down here!”

It wasn’t long before the age-old Devon versus Cornwall competitiveness appeared; Chunk won a Cornish pasty competition, and “the fact we come from Devon got the backs of a few Cornish competitors up, but the fact is that we were producing a better product!” Simon doesn’t hold back when it comes to the importance of evolution and modern-thinking in the food industry, and cites this win as “an example of how Protected Designation of Origin labels can sometimes work to the detriment of the products, as the products can become watered down versions of themselves. We call those ‘Cornish’ pasties you see in train stations ‘pastiches’, as they’re not genuine. They’ve been made in big factories and are run by accountants. When accountants run businesses, you lose the passion, the heart, the soul and the need to do things properly.”

Good, honest food is at the heart of Chunk, and once established as a pie company the business started branching out to other traditional favourites. “To bolster sales in the summer we brought in a range of pasties – they’re very popular as a snack in the West Country, and go down brilliantly with holidaymakers. We also added smaller pork pies to our selection, and sausage rolls were a natural extension of this. We’re never shy of moving forward and always have new ideas in the pipeline; we’ve got a goat pie coming out soon which we’re very excited about!” Real ingredients used properly are key to Chunk’s success, and Simon’s not one to cut corners for the sake of naysayers. “We’ve been using butter and lard for 10 years now,” he says, “and when I received letters from Trading Standards saying I should be using margarine I kicked off big time – why would I use poisonous, carginogenic margarine rather than the real thing? It’s about being sensible and real.”

“We’re a very honorable company,” explains Simon. “In our game it’s easy to fudge and fettle for awards, but we’ve never done that. We stand up to scrutiny, and if the judges make a fair point for something we need to change, we will be strong and humble enough to do so. We’re not arrogant about our products; we’re there to wow people and give them what they want.” This approach has not gone unnoticed. “A blogger once referred to us as ‘maximum taste, minimum pretension,’ which I love,” Simon says. “We’re pie guys – let’s knock ‘em dead with flavour. Let’s not be blah. If you’re going to say something is Chicken & Tarragon, whack a decent amount of tarragon in it. If you say something’s going to have red wine in it, put a decent amount of good, strong wine in there – don’t muck about.”

Although award-winning, Chunk is brilliantly down-to-earth, and Simon puts the brand’s success down to using good, proper ingredients and embracing the traditions of their role as ‘pie guys’: “the reason we’re here is to balance out the carcasses for the meat industry. The back end of a carcass is home to all the steaks that everyone wants to eat, and the front end is all the tougher bits nobody knows what to do with,” he says, “so we cut it down and slow cook it with lots of lovely ingredients like herbs and garlic, and end up with delightful casseroles. Only by being able to sell those cheaper cuts at the front of the carcass, use them properly and add value to them, only then can you sell the back cuts of meat at a sensible price.” Chunk’s dedication to keeping things simple isn’t always demonstrated in the work of other producers, says Simon. “We’ve all got a little bit caught up in being overly clever with our meat, but actually, a slow-cooked, tougher piece of meat really is delicious.”

Simon likens the brand to a reliable and down-to-earth Land Rover: “flashy Porsches come and go, but we just keep on tackling the hurdles and climbing the hills.” Honest, good quality food is the order of the day at Chunk – and that’s something to celebrate.