This is the Food Place food court, located at Pavilion Mall. The food court is located beside the Oriental Kopi Restaurant. I will introduce you to another food from another stall.
This time I ordered Apple Pie from the Nan Yang Siew Bao stall for breakfast, which cost RM3.80 per piece.
This apple pie is a mini lattice-topped tart, baked in an individual portion size. It features a crisp, golden-brown shortcrust base and a filling of tender apple slices cooked with sugar and spices, resulting in a sweet and slightly caramelised flavour. The lattice top allows the filling to peek through, adding both texture and aroma. Unlike the Western deep-dish style, this version is smaller, more portable, and suited to the grab-and-go bakery culture often found in Malaysia.
Apple pie has its roots in medieval Europe, with the earliest recipes dating back to 14th-century England. Apples were abundant and easy to preserve, making them a common pie filling.
The dish travelled with European settlers to America, where it became a national symbol of comfort food, leading to the phrase “as American as apple pie.” American versions are often larger, with spiced fillings of cinnamon and nutmeg.
In Malaysia and other parts of Asia, bakeries adapted apple pie into smaller pastries, often sold alongside egg tarts, siew bao, and other Chinese-style baked goods. These versions usually feature a crisp crust rather than the flaky puff pastry style, catering to local tastes for neatly portioned snacks.
Nan Yang Siew Bao’s apple pie is an example of this East-meets-West adaptation: a Western-origin dessert reimagined into a compact, bakery-friendly form, served in the same setting as traditional Chinese pastries like sesame biscuits and siew bao.
