Harry's Cafe de Wheels is an iconic pie cart located on Cowper Wharf Road in

Woolloomooloo Woolloomooloo ( ) is a harbourside, inner-city eastern suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 1.5 kilometres east of the central business district, in the local government area of the City of Sydney. It is in a low-lying, former dockla ...

Sydney Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...

, Australia, near the

Finger Wharf The Finger Wharf is a heritage-listed former wharf and passenger terminal and now marina, residential apartments, hotel and restaurant located at 6 Cowper Wharf Road, in the inner city Sydney suburb of Woolloomooloo, Australia. It was designed ...

and

Fleet Base East Fleet Base East is a Royal Australian Navy (RAN) major fleet base that comprises several naval establishments and facilities clustered around Sydney Harbour, centred on HMAS ''Kuttabul''. Fleet Base East extends beyond the borders of ''Kuttabu ...

. They are best known for their dish "Tiger Pie", an

Australian meat pie In Australia and New Zealand, a meat pie is a hand-sized pie containing diced or minced meat and gravy, sometimes with onion, mushrooms or cheese and is often consumed as a takeaway food snack. This variant of the standard meat pie is conside ...

topped with mashed potato, mushy peas and gravy; it was named after the pie cart's founder Harry "Tiger" Edwards. Other Harry's Cafe de Wheels operate in

Baulkham Hills Baulkham Hills (;) is a suburb in the Hills District, New South Wales, Hills District of Greater Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It is located within north-west of the Sydney central business district mostly within the Loca ...

, Darling Quarter, Greystanes, Kogarah,

Liverpool Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...

, Marsden Park,

Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to: *Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England, United Kingdom *Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England, United Kingdom *Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area ...

(using a converted Sydney R-Class Tram), Penrith, St. Marys, Tempe and Woodbine.

Description

Harry's Cafe de Wheels was a moveable food van, similar to those found at

funfair A fair (archaic: faire or fayre) is a gathering of people for a variety of entertainment or commercial activities. Fairs are typically temporary with scheduled times lasting from an afternoon to several weeks. Fairs showcase a wide range of go ...

s, with a hung awning. It has been moved a number of times in its history but the van is now permanently fixed on a masonry base. The caravan walls have been decorated with custom painted murals by Alan Puckett, a motoring art specialist. The inside walls of the cart are decorated with pictures and murals of famous visitors. The site is considered a Sydney icon and an institution in the local area. The significance of the location is reflected by its inclusion on the New South Wales

National Trust The National Trust () is a heritage and nature conservation charity and membership organisation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The Trust was founded in 1895 by Octavia Hill, Sir Robert Hunter and Hardwicke Rawnsley to "promote the ...

Powerhouse Museum The Powerhouse Museum, formerly known as the Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences (MAAS), is a collection of 4 museums in Sydney, owned by the Government of New South Wales. Powerhouse is a contemporary museum of applied arts and sciences, explori ...

collection. Harry's pies are supplied from Hannah's Pies, its factory in the inner city suburb of Ultimo.

History

Harry "Tiger" Edwards opened the original caravan cafe, named simply ''Harry's'', near the gates of the

Naval Yard in 1936. He served with the

Second Australian Imperial Force The Second Australian Imperial Force (2nd AIF, or Second AIF) was the volunteer expeditionary force of the Australian Army in the Second World War. It was formed following the declaration of war on Nazi Germany, with an initial strength of one ...

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, during which time the cafe was not operational. The cart re-opened upon his return from the war in 1945. The name ''Cafe de Wheels'' came about because of the requirement from the

city council A municipal council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as a city council, town council, town board, community council, borough counc ...

that mobile food caravans had to move a minimum of 12 inches (30 cm) each day. The cart has been moved to various locations on Cowper Wharf Road, mostly due to re-development work in the Woolloomooloo Bay area. Local legend tells that the name was temporarily changed to ''Cafe de Axle'' at one point when the wheels were stolen. As the years passed, 'Harry's Cafe de Wheels' gained new fame as a tourist attraction. A visit to the caravan became a 'must' for visiting celebrities such as

Frank Sinatra Francis Albert Sinatra (; December 12, 1915 – May 14, 1998) was an American singer and actor. Honorific nicknames in popular music, Nicknamed the "Chairman of the Board" and "Ol' Blue Eyes", he is regarded as one of the Time 100: The Most I ...

Robert Mitchum Robert Charles Durman Mitchum (August 6, 1917 – July 1, 1997) was an American actor. He is known for his antihero roles and film noir appearances. He received nominations for an Academy Award and a BAFTA Award. He received a star on the Holl ...

and

Marlene Dietrich Marie Magdalene "Marlene" DietrichBorn as Maria Magdalena, not Marie Magdalene, according to Dietrich's biography by her daughter, Maria Riva ; however, Dietrich's biography by Charlotte Chandler cites "Marie Magdalene" as her birth name . (, ; ...

. In 1974,

Colonel Sanders Harland David Sanders (September 9, 1890 December 16, 1980) was an American businessman and founder of fast food chicken restaurant chain KFC, Kentucky Fried Chicken (now known as KFC). He later acted as the company's brand ambassador and sym ...

stopped at Harry's and enjoyed the food so much that he ate three 'pies and peas' while leaning on his walking stick in front of the caravan. A picture of Sanders taken during the visit still hangs in the caravan today. Harry's specialises today in the same basic food that was popular back in the 1940s, such as pies and

mushy peas Mushy peas are dried marrowfat peas which are first soaked overnight in water with baking soda, and then rinsed in fresh water, after which the peas are gathered in a saucepan, covered with water, and brought to a boil, and then simmered until t ...

. During the 1970s Harry's introduced

hot dogs A hot dog is a grilled, steamed, or boiled sausage served in the slit of a partially sliced bun. The term ''hot dog'' can also refer to the sausage itself. The sausage used is a wiener ( Vienna sausage) or a frankfurter ( Frankfurter Würs ...

, mostly to appease the American sailors.

In popular culture

* Australian singer

Peter Blakeley Peter Blakeley is an Australian white soul/adult contemporary singer and songwriter. Blakeley was a lead singer of the Rockmelons in the mid-1980s. He launched a solo career in 1987 and had a massive hit single in Australia in 1989 with " C ...

named his 1989 album ''Harry's Cafe de Wheels'' with a photo on the cover. * The cafe was featured in the second season of the

reality television Reality television is a genre of television programming that documents purportedly unscripted real-life situations, often starring ordinary people rather than professional actors. Reality television emerged as a distinct genre in the early 1990s ...

show ''

The Amazing Race ''The Amazing Race'' is an adventure reality competition franchise in which teams of two people race around the world in competition with other teams. ''The Amazing Race'' is split into legs, with teams tasked to deduce clues, navigate themselv ...

'' in 2002 as the site of a Fast Forward challenge where one team had to eat two meat pies. It was also featured on the first season of '' HaMerotz LaMillion'', the Israeli version of ''

''. * It was featured on the Sydney episode of '' Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern'' on the

Travel Channel Travel Channel (stylized as Trvl Channel since 2018) is an American pay television television channel, channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, who previously owned the channel from 1997 to 2007. The channel is headquartered in Manhattan, with ...

. * It was featured in season 2, episode 11 of television series '' The Bachelor'', where contestant Laurina bemoaned receiving a "dirty street pie".The Bachelor sparks flood of support for iconic pie cart after Blake and Laurina's disaster date

Herald Sun The ''Herald Sun'' is a Conservatism, conservative daily tabloid newspaper based in Melbourne, Australia, published by The Herald and Weekly Times, a subsidiary of News Corp Australia, itself a subsidiary of the American Rupert Murdoch, Murd ...

, 5 September 2014

References

Other sources

* Harry's Cafe de Wheels websit

Accessed July 2006. * National Trust Register; ''Harry's Cafe de Wheels'', Register Entr

Accessed July 2006. * Burke, N; ''Cafe de Wheels and a danger to walkers''; '' Daily Telegraph (Sydney), Daily Telegraph'', 27 December 2003 * Jinman, R; ''Crash Courses''; ''

Sydney Morning Herald ''The Sydney Morning Herald'' (''SMH'') is a daily tabloid newspaper published in Sydney, Australia, and owned by Nine Entertainment. Founded in 1831 as the ''Sydney Herald'', the ''Herald'' is the oldest continuously published newspaper in ...

'', 25 May 2004

External links

*
Powerhouse Museum – Harry's Cafe de Wheels, 1945
National Trust – article explaining the significance of the structure (includes historic images including one of the late