'Biggest mooncake in NZ history' to celebrate Chinese Moon Festival in Auckland

Sky City pastry chefs Ling Wu, Prudence Rong and Alice Chen with the 400 kg Moon Cake they helped make for the Moon Festival celebration held at SkyCity in Auckland. Photo / Peter Meecham.

It took 30 pastry chefs, four days of work, using a total of 300kg of red bean paste, 90kg of flour, 35kg of syrup and more than 700 salted duck egg yolks - and SkyCity now holds the unofficial record having baked New Zealand's largest moon cake.

With a diameter of 1.5m, the cake was unveiled this morning at the SkyCity atrium and was cut at noon for sharing to a crowd of nearly 200 who turned up to celebrate the occasion.

Today is the Chinese Moon Festival, which occurs on the 15th day of the eighth Chinese lunar month when the moon is at its roundest and brightest.

Sky City Chief Operating Officer, Michael Ahearne cuts the moon cake. Photo / Peter Meecham.

SkyCity pastry chef Alice Chen, 31, said she and her team had mixed feelings about achieving the feat.

"We are all really excited and happy of course that we have pulled this off, but I think it's also mixed with a sense of relief," Chen said.

"Even until last night, we weren't sure if it was going to happen."

This is the first time she has participated in baking a mooncake since moving to New Zealand from Wuhan, China, four years ago.

A crowd of about 200 turned up to partake in eating a slice of the 400 kg mooncake at SkyCity in Auckland. Photo / Peter Meecham.

It's also the first time that SkyCity is celebrating the festival considered to be the second most important by the Chinese behind Chinese New Year.

"Some of our chefs worked overnight and didn't sleep, we did feel a little bit of pressure," Chen said.

"But after looking at what we've made, and the happy people eating it, it's worth it."

Despite SkyCity's claim that the giant mooncake is "the biggest in New Zealand history", it pales in size when compared to the largest mooncake ever baked.

The SkyCity pastry team with the mould for one slice of the 400 kg moon cake. Photo / Jason Oxenham.

According to the Guinness World Records, the biggest was baked by the culinary teams at Parkside Plaza and Shanghai Marriot Hotel Changfeng, both in China, on September 19 2013.

Made by 15 professional chefs in three days, it weighed 2496.4kg and had a diameter of 2.57m.

Moon Festival, also known as the Mid-Autumn Festival, can be traced back to the custom of moon worship during the Zhou Dynasty more than 3000 years ago.

The tradition of eating mooncakes dates back to the Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368) under the Mongols.

SkyCity event co-ordinator Coco Cui said the distributing of mooncake signified the sharing of blessings, happiness and wholeness.

A three-day event, in a similar style to the popular Auckland Lantern Festival featuring Chinese lanterns, cultural performances and food kicks off this evening at Potters Park on Dominion Rd, Balmoral.

Celebrations are also being planned at Lloyd Elsmore Park in Pakuranga tomorrow.