Hey Pie People, don’t miss this collab
Hey Pie People, I’ve been working on a super top secret project with an international American burger chain … ”
That’s how Raeanne Young Sagan broke the news about Hey Pie People’s collaboration with Shake Shack to her Instagram followers. Raeanne is the talented pie maker behind Hey Pie People, the creator of highly coveted handmade pies that are known for being scrumptious and also selling out in seconds.
So it’s no big surprise that the collab, which hit Shake Shack stores on Jan. 23, has also been selling out regularly, sometimes even before lunchtime. There are two menu items to choose from, both highlighting Shake Shack’s vanilla frozen custard which is made with “real cane sugar, cage-free eggs and milk from dairy farmers who pledged never to use artificial growth hormones”: the Mango Manchego Concrete and the Hey Banana Fanna Toffee Shake. The collab features merch too—a shirt and a bandana because Raeanne loves bandanas—which you can purchase from shakeshack.ph.
The Mango Manchego Concrete blends Shake Shack’s vanilla frozen custard with the cult favorite Mango Manchego Pie of Hey Pie People. The concrete is topped with mango, grated Manchego cheese, and finished with Hey Pie People’s signature flaky crust.
Over the years, Raeanne has created a lot of creative, inventive, delightful pie flavors but for the Shake Shack collab, both she and Kate Villasenor, Shake Shack Philippines’ marketing director and a longtime Hey Pie People fan, knew that it had to be the Mango Manchego. Raeanne said, “It’s our most requested pie. People request this pie off-season, any season, Christmas, birthdays, Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, they will be like, ‘Can we have Mango Manchego?’ All year round, people are asking for it. It’s a little bit crave-worthy, I think.”
Pie in ice cream form
People can satisfy those cravings because the concrete tastes exactly like the pie—sweet, but not overly so, salty, creamy, fresh, so so good.
“It is the pie in ice cream form,” Raeanne said. “There’s a whole slice of pie in there.”
Five percent of all Mango Manchego Concrete sales will be donated to Ayala Foundation’s Center of Excellence in Public Elementary Education (Centex).
Raeanne wondered which of her pies would make the best shake. She thought of her Black Sesame Banoffee Pie. “This is gonna make such a good milkshake,” she told herself. And when she tried it, she was blown away. “Honestly, it shocked me. I cannot stop drinking that milkshake. We did a tasting and I finished the whole thing.”
Hey Banana Fanna Toffee Shake—yes, inspired by the ‘80s song “The Name Game”—was dubbed that by Guia Garcia Bohol, winner of Shake Shack’s Name That Shake Giveaway.
To make the shake, Shake Shack’s vanilla frozen custard is blended with Hey Pie People’s Banoffee Pie, special black sesame toffee sauce, toffee bits, and ground black sesame mix. It’s also topped with Hey Pie People’s flaky crust. “There’s also a full slice of pie in that milkshake,” Raeanne said.
Just like Raeanne, we were blown away when we tried it. The combination of sweet bananas, nutty black sesame, creamy custard and crunchy toffee bits was so satisfying.
In fact, if you made us choose between the concrete and the shake, we couldn’t. So if you’re going to Shake Shack, we say bring a friend and share both. Order the collab with Crinkle Cut Fries or Chicken Bites—they’re a great match.
Shake Shack is also releasing a limited-time menu this week: Chicken Caesar Burger and Parmesan fries. “You can order it with the Hey Pie People collab because the collab is until March 23,” said Villasenor.
Shake Shack order
We asked Raeanne what her go-to Shake Shack order is: “ShackBurger, fries and before this, I was a strawberry milkshake kind of girl.”
And now? “Black Sesame Banoffee.”
Raeanne, who was born and raised in California, moved to the Philippines with her husband Colin soon after they got married. That was ten years ago. “I wanted to come back because I missed it, I was feeling homesick. I would visit my dad in the Philippines and every time I had to get back on the plane, I would cry ugly tears … I told my husband, I don’t know how long I want to be there for. I just kind of want to try it out. But I just feel like an emptiness inside when I leave.”
Raeanne, so used to missing things like Filipino breakfast and daing na bangus, didn’t think she’d feel homesick about the US. But then, she had first Thanksgiving in the Philippines. “I was actually really homesick for pumpkin pie … Nobody here seemed to remember it was Thanksgiving. I saw all my friends in the States having turkey and we had nothing, and it’s just the two of us in this tiny little apartment so I started making pie.”
She continued, “A few years later, I got pregnant, and that’s when the cravings really started. So it was pie all the time. People are like, ‘When did you start baking?’ I never started baking. I only make one thing and that’s pie. I think of myself as a pie maker more than a baker.”
There were no plans to turn Hey Pie People into a business. In fact, during those early days, during the pandemic, she would trade her pie for “ulam, anything.”
But people really wanted to buy her pies. Eventually, she relented. Raeanne said, “It was like I couldn’t not do it.”
On Saturdays, they took weekly orders on Instagram (@hey.pie.people) and their sign-up form would fill up in as fast as 30 seconds. That was back then.
Increased production
It’s easier to buy their pies now, Raeanne assured us. They’ve increased production and now they have dedicated drivers delivering their pies all over Metro Manila. Raeanne and Colin—known to Hey Pie People fans as Dough Dad—continue to make all the pies by hand. They run Hey Pie People out of their Alabang home, juggling it with raising their three kids—twins Caio and Rafaela, and Cenzo.
Right now, they are offering three special pies for Chinese New Year: Nectarine Ginger Pie with Salted Butter Almond Crisp, Lucky Cherry CNY Pie, and Chinese Chicken Pot Pie in Scallion Pancake Crust. You can order these flavors for delivery until Feb. 2.
Hey Pie People doesn’t do a lot of collabs. Previously, they’ve only worked with Toyo Eatery and Uniqlo. When asked why she said yes to Shake Shack, Raeanne said two things.
One, “I wanted the opportunity to bring my pies to as many people as possible, all the people who are like, ‘You’re so far,’ ‘It’s expensive,’ ‘How am I supposed to finish a whole pie?’”
Two, “One hundred percent this was all because of Kate Villasenor. She is an OG Pie Person who would come to my house to pick up during the pandemic … every Saturday, at 10 a.m. I would see her in my slots, and she’s had so many different kinds of pies. We were standing outside of my house toward the end of the pandemic and she was like, ‘I know you don’t do collaborations, and you don’t leave Alabang and you make everything from your house and you’re a home baker, but would you ever consider doing something with Shake Shack?’”
Villasenor told Lifestyle, “I was hesitant to ask Raeanne because she’s very open that this is not a business for her. This is her passion project.”
But she tried and Raeanne’s response? “I would 100 percent work with you.”
Raeanne told Lifestyle, “Because honestly, the story, it’s really about me and her. It’s about Kate, a Pie Person, because there’s no one else who I feel would be able to come and take our story and bring it together with an international brand… I don’t have a lot of space in my life, and I don’t have a lot of time to do superfluous collabs or anything that’s not very purpose-driven. I think I knew that I was in really good hands, and that she was gonna take this to the next level. So much of this is her vision and because of her deep understanding of who I am, how I work, and my values, and her understanding of Shake Shack. She made the whole thing happen. And it was awesome.”
The two found themselves in Shake Shack in Alabang Town Center where Raeanne was given a behind-the-scenes look at how concretes and shakes are made before they started doing R&D. “They gave me complete creative freedom. When you’re looking for someone to collaborate with, you really need someone who’s gonna understand you. And Kate was like, ‘We just want you to be you.’”
The Hey Pie People X Shake Shack collab is available until March 23 at all Manila branches of Shake Shack except NAIA T3.
The Mango Manchego Concrete is at Alabang Town Center, Central Square in BGC, SM Megamall, Greenbelt 5, SM Mall of Asia and SM North Edsa.
