Freshly made pastry dough sits stacked on a table, ready to be formed into meat pies at Waltzing Kangaroo on Tuesday, Feb. 25, 2025, in Fort Collins, Colo. (Parker Seibold, The Gazette)
FORT COLLINS * There's an old song, "Waltzing Matilda." It's an old Australian song.
"It's about a wandering hobo," Steve Phillips says.
He would not describe himself as a hobo back in 2004, but a ski bum, yes. He was a wandering soul indeed, an Australian skiing to his heart's desire at Keystone Resort before wandering back to his native country. That's one translation of "waltzing," he says: wandering.
All explaining, years later, the name of his hit eatery here in northern Colorado: Waltzing Kangaroo.
"Because we roamed or wandered from Australia," Steve says.
By "we," he also means his wife, Aimée. She was a New Orleans native who met Steve back then on the slopes of Keystone, an adventurous spirit, so drawn by his energy that she agreed to return with him to Australia.
"I moved and just never used the other end of that round trip ticket," she says.
They would marry and start a family. Then Aimée agreed to another one of his ideas.
It was 2015. The idea had been an idea long enough, dating back to those cold days at Keystone, where Steve wished for the warm, handheld delicacy of his native land.
The meat pie was as ingrained in Australia as that old song. And it was time to bring it to America.
"Our youngest kid was 4 months old, and our older kid was 4 years old," Aimée says. "It was even more insane than moving to Australia."
The couple would be guided by a statement posted front and center at Waltzing Kangaroo:
"We're on a mission to share the world's most perfect food: the Aussie meat pie."
Ten years later, mission accomplished.
Hide as it might in a strip between a Colorado State University T-shirt shop, a FedEx store and a Subway, Waltzing Kangaroo is no secret.
"People come in here and grab a hot pie for lunch, then they'll walk out with 15 to 20 pies to stock their freezer," Steve says.
Fresh was always the idea -- pastry baked daily, to be stuffed with carefully selected meats and ingredients for savory, velvety stews precisely mixed, seasoned and cooked. But yes, demand over the years led to the freezer.
And it's not just loyalists in Fort Collins stocking up. The pies are shipped around the country now.
How many? Steve seems overwhelmed by the question. "A lot," he says.
The chicken pot pie sounds most familiar to Americans, but it is not the most popular handheld option at Waltzing Kangaroo.
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That might be the steak and pepper gravy. Or the lamb and rosemary gravy. Madras curry is a more exotic choice, joined by specialties that rotate monthly: steak and French onion last month, chicken cordon bleu this month, and in the past takes on Thai, Indian, gumbo and cheeseburger.
The variety speaks to what makes the Aussie meat pie "the world's most perfect food," Steve says. "Because it's a vessel, and you can add whatever culinary flair you want."
The career chef knew there to be an art and science to the most perfect food. There was an art to hand-making and -pinching the two crusts forming the buttery, flaky but firm containment, 5 inches in diameter, 1.5 inches deep. There was a science to slow-cooking the meat and mixing the stews. Some pies are the result of three days of preparation.
"Everything is measured to the mil," Steve says. "That's why it's always consistent when you have it."
He knew, deep down, it would work in America.
Knew it back in 2004 at Keystone and knew it through the years in Australia, where he ran a bakery. He would travel here and there with Aimée to visit her family in New Orleans.
"He was always like, 'It's crazy there's no meat pies here,'" Aimée says.
It seemed a crazy idea to pursue. After all, the couple was happy in New South Wales, living close to the beach with their two little boys, living comfortably in a generational business. Steve came from a family of bakers.
So he had the baking and business know-how. And he had the wandering spirit.
"I was always one of those that was like, I never want to grow up thinking could've, should've, would've," Steve says. "I didn't want to get older thinking, I could've done this, I should've done this, I would've done this."
Aimée was right there with him. She was right there with an infant son at her hip, running all sorts of errands leading up to Waltzing Kangaroo's opening in 2016.
"It was like do-or-die," she recalls. "We had been literally drained of everything. It was very stressful, very exhausting, but the bottom line was it had to work. There was no choice."
It worked -- the food as well as the name inspired by that old song.
"That's the most amazing part, how big the brand has become," Steve says.
"I'll be around town and see a guy with a hat. 'Hey, Waltzing Kangaroo!' That's been the coolest thing."
On the menu
Forks are available at Waltzing Kangaroo, though the meat pies (about $10) are meant to be eaten by hand. The thick crust nicely contains a variety of meat-packed stews.
Four varieties of diced steak: one with brown gravy, another with black pepper gravy, another infused with Guinness and mushroom and another mixed with bacon and cheese. The lamb and rosemary gravy is another go-to.
The beef shepherd's pie combines ground beef, peas, carrots and gravy and is topped with mashed potatoes. Chicken pot pie is expected while curry is not: roasted chicken and peas blended with yellow curry and 14 herbs and spices. For vegetarians: a pie packed with roasted potato, squash, broccoli, cauliflower and carrots in a cream sauce.
The sausage roll ($6) is another favorite on the go -- billed as "a timeless Aussie classic." From a family of Australian bakers, chef and owner Steve Phillips shows off his chops with a selection of handheld desserts ($6): an apple turnover, coffee ganache tart and a custard tart.