The news of world's largest Lamington made in Sylvia Park Mall, Auckland earlier in July this year made headlines and is on its way to be registered in the Guinness Book of World Records.
The drive behind the idea of making the world's largest cake in NZ was of an Auckland based social enterprise - Cook's Night Off and it was eventually baked by Creative Edge Food – a business owned by an enterprising Kiwi-Indian couple.
The Lamington was prepared and publicly presented at Sylvia Park Mall on July 21 on World Lamington Day.
The baker's team from Creative Edge Food Co. and Suzzane Canal (Centre) from Cook's Night Off at Sylvia Park Mall on July 21 (Picture Supplied)
The chocolate lamington weighed a whopping 2770 kgs beating the current world record held by Australian bakery Quality Desserts and the Toowoomba Chamber of Commerce for a massive 2,361 kg lamington, created in 2011.
To work upon a nebulous idea of baking the Brobdingnagian cake, Cook's Night Off had approached the neighbour bakery Creative Edge Foods Co. to see if their shared dream could be materialised and eventually be registered into Guinness Book of World Records.
The preparation for this mega-project needed a lot of resources, including ingredients, manpower, a venue, funding and promotions to eventually pull everything together.
Appointed Chartered Accountant examining the lamington bearing wooded base on July 21 (Picture Supplied)
Speaking to the Indian Weekender, Suzzane Canal of Cook's Night Off said it took a month's preparation for them to get the project ready for a presentation that coincidentally fell on World Lamington Day on July 21.
After a passionate effort to spread a word around a number of individuals and organisations had come forward to donate materials that included flour, sugar, eggs, etc.
However, it was still not enough to cover the cost of the whole project, which was around $30,000.
A certain chunk of the funding/material was met through donations and contributions, and the rest, either in manpower or dollar value was put together by the bakers' Creative Edge Food and Cook's Night Off.
World's largest Lamington on display at Sylvia Park Mall
What might surprise the readers, and the community as well that the hands behind the world's largest cake were a team of bakers from Kiwi Indian and ethnic migrant community, that mainstream media missed reporting when the news broke out.
The bakers' team of 24 made the whole cake happen from scratch to structure and display, led by Kiwi Indian origin businesswoman and owner of Creative Edge Food Zeenat Sattar, her team, namely Farhan Sattar, Kevin Patel, Ashish Arya, Bandhan Patel, Anis Millwala, Mehfuza Millwala, Carlos, Ruhi Arora, Praful Sharma, Harpreet Kaur amongst others.
The team had to figure out the material to be stored and then to be used in time in sequence to prepare the batter for the cake slabs which put together will augment the structure for the world's largest cake.
Speaking to The Indian Weekender, Zeenat Sattar said preparing the slabs was the most integral part of the whole project. The bakery had the capacity of making slabs at a time in there over and each weighing around 5 kgs.
One big task for the team after baking was to get each batch of 30 slabs to cool down, store it properly to maintain its textural integrity and then transport it carefully in multiple trips at wee hours of the night to Sylvia Park Mall where the placement and building would be done, in full view of the public.
Thirteen people worked for 48 hours in the kitchen and 11 others in bringing and placing the slabs together on a wooden plank and put icing such as jam, grated coconut and chocolate sauce to be added on each layer in the building process.
Bakers giving their finishing touch to the lamington
Zeenat's father, an architect and Computer Engineer by profession took the responsibility of planning the placements of the slabs together- so they are stuck together standing for hours.
Once all the slabs were transported to the mall, the final part of the task commenced, layering them on a large wooden plank. The work started at 6 a.m. on July 21, and a registered chartered accountant was appointed to weigh the wooden structure base before the placement began, and he joined again at the end of the work in the evening.
It is a requirement by the Guinness Book of World Records that if a team member from there cannot be present, a chartered accountant is appointed who independently examines the project/result and files in his findings to GBWR officials, the final decision and certificate of which will come out after 3-4 months of application.
Appointed Chartered Accountant examining the lamington bearing wooded base on July 21 (Picture Supplied)
Tired and exhausted with already over 30 hours of mixing, baking, cooling and transportation- the team still kept going with their project in witnessed by hundreds of passing by shoppers on a busy Saturday afternoon of Alert Level 1 at Sylvia Park Mall.
Examined by the appointed Chartered Accountant, the final weight of the Lamington was announced to be 2770 kgs or 2.77 tons quashing the previous world record by Australia (2,361 in 2011) by over 400 kgs.
The team rejoiced, and so did the shoppers who were informed that New Zealand baked world's largest Lamington would soon be registered into the Guinness Book of World Records.
The structure made was equal to 50,000 lamingtons, which after distribution at the mall were wrapped, packed and given to Auckland City Mission, via Cook's Night Off to be further given off to the needy in and around Auckland.
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