Whenever Patrick Murdock takes his pies outside, he gets swarmed. As the sales and marketing manager at Fireman Derek's Pie Shop, he takes all of the photos for the brand's Instagram account, often right in front of the graffiti covering one wall of the building. Within seconds, people start hovering.
"Can I take a picture of that?"
"Where'd you get that?"
"I need a photo too!"
"Are you gonna share?"
Those were just a few of the comments from the dozen people who surrounded Murdock as we took photos of the shop's gravity-defying crazy shake, a milkshake topped with a six-inch-tall slice of Ice Cream Sundae Pie. The dessert's a riot of bold colors, much like the murals that cover most of the walls in Wynwood, the artsy neighborhood in Miami where the shop is located. "I tried taking photos on Second Avenue, but that was even crazier," Murdock said.
Murdock and the Fireman Derek's team welcomes the swarm — the word of mouth (and photos) have made the shop a must-visit for anyone visiting Miami. Derek Kaplan, the Fireman Derek of Fireman Derek's (who, yes, was an actual firefighter) designs his pies to be sensory overload. While many of the dishes are written on the wall, there's no formal menu. Instead, everything you can order is displayed in bakery cases in front of you, so you can point to whatever catches your eye. At any given time, there are more than 20 pies to choose from, plus brownies, bread puddings, empanadas, quiches, and cookie bars.
Kaplan's been whipping up pies at his Wynwood shop for the past four years, but long before that, he was working as a firefighter and baking key lime pies on the side. He eventually opened a food truck, which led to opening his first store.
As business picked up, the tiny shop — it's roughly the size of a studio apartment — kept its ovens running 24 hours a day to keep up with demand. Eventually, they had to move most of the baking to another kitchen offsite.
These days, the shop bakes about 1,000 pies a month, some of which you can order and have delivered locally through Amazon. As the shop becomes more nationally known, Kaplan's team is working on opening a second storefront this summer and plans on opening more in the future.
They're ready for any swarming and fanboying that goes along with it.
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