They’ve got fruit pies, meat pies, tiny pies, pot pies, pie on a stick, hand pies and lotus cup pies — and the folks at The Right Slice are still coming up with different ways to serve more than 50
They’ve got fruit pies, meat pies, tiny pies, pot pies, pie on a stick, hand pies and lotus cup pies — and the folks at The Right Slice are still coming up with different ways to serve more than 50 flavors of fruit pies and 30 flavors of meat pies.
“We’re always using our creativity and asking what customers want,” said Sandy Poehnelt, owner of The Right Slice. “Like the hand pies, those are little turnovers that are new because customers wanted something that they could eat when they were driving.”
Brunches of biscuits and gravy, or quiche and organic salad greens from the North Shore, are two other new additions to The Right Slice’s menu.
“We wanted to provide another option for breakfast, so we went with biscuits and gravy and quiche because the way those are made are so similar to pie crust,” Poehnelt said. “And we added the organic salad greens as just another option as well.”
The goal, Poehnelt said, is to have a place where people can drop by and pick up meals on the go.
“We have different meal options on the menu; like, for example, you can get four different flavors of pot pies with drinks for the family’s beach day and everybody is happy,” Poehnelt said.
The Right Slice has a store in Kalaheo and just opened the doors to their second location at the Harbor Mall in Lihue. All of the new additions come just in time for the most important pie holiday of the year: Thanksgiving.
“It’s going to get crazy here,” Poehnelt said. “We already have a huge stack of orders for pies.”
For the next few weeks, Poehnelt and her staff will be all about pumpkin filling, cranberries, walnuts and apples. They’ll be taking pie orders up until Nov. 21.
“After that, we’re cutting off the pie orders so we can get all of our supplies and get ourselves organized,” Poehnelt said. “We don’t hire on any seasonal help for this because we’re really focused on quality, so our staff works so incredibly hard during this time of year.”
Kylie Kane of Koloa has been working at The Right Slice for a year. She said even though the holidays are hectic, she loves working for Poehnelt.
“Sandy really takes care of us as employees,” Kane said. “She really invests in us and makes us feel special.”
Kane said the great work atmosphere spurs her to do her best when she’s making those holiday pies, and the idea of taking a few days off after the Thanksgiving rush is enough incentive to get through.
The most popular holiday pie is the Cranberry Walnut Pudding Pie. Poehnelt said that as Christmas approaches, The Right Slice will be releasing its ever-popular Chocolate Mint and Eggnog pies.
“My favorite out of all of them, though, is the Island Lemon,” Poehnelt said. “I don’t have too much of a sweet tooth, and this pie is tart and fresh.”
The Island Lemon Pie is a basic lemon meringue pie with a twist — there’s no meringue.
“The meringue wasn’t holding up at the farmers’ markets at the beginning, so we took it out and put a top on the pie,” Poehnelt said. “With the Meyer lemons being in season right now, it’s perfect, and it’s a little bit different kind of lemon pie.”
It was at the farmers’ markets that Poehnelt’s business first began to pick up steam six years ago when she started The Right Slice.
“I had moved here and was working for a cafe, and part of my job was making the apple pie,” Poehnelt said. “People kept saying that it was the best pie ever and they couldn’t get that kind of homemade pie anywhere anymore.”
The job at that little cafe didn’t work out for Poehnelt, but pie did.
“I really didn’t want to take a job off the market having just moved here, and I thought, I can make pie,” Poehnelt said. “So I made pie.”
In those pies, Poehnelt includes only the best ingredients. She sources everything she can from Kauai before looking to the other islands, and then finally to the Mainland for pie supplies.
“We try to get as much as we can local, and we’ve built some great relationships with farms and people here on the island,” Poehnelt said. “And we have customers who bring in fruit for store credit.”
Both of The Right Slice’s stores are open six days a week, and on Sunday for brunch. You can also grab a piece from stands at various farmers’ markets throughout the island, and at Hanapepe’s Friday Art Night. The Right Slice also sells pie at both the Kapaa and Kilauea Saturday Art Nights.
