Ed Levine did an Upper East Side treats run on Monday, and this was one of our favorites; the "Mocha Madness" cookie from Two Little Red Hens. The walnut studded dark chocolate batter gets spiked with a little bit of brewed Irving Farm coffee, giving it that faint hint of mocha that never quite reaches madness levels. 1652 2nd Avenue, New York, NY 10028 (nr. 86th Street; map); twolittleredhens.com
A friend had recommended visiting Fukumatsu for ramen, but I was skeptical because the restaurant specializes in sushi and only has one ramen dish buried within its dinner menu; the Fukumatsu ramen, with a choice between salt or miso as the soup base. Then again, what's wrong with having one choice when it delivers everything you want?
It's a concept one wants to love: tea infused into pastries of all sorts—cookies, scones, puddings, and muffins galore. A concept with great potential, if it's properly executed. But somewhere between idea and production, something is lost, and that is where Amai Tea & Bake House falls weak.
Clockwise from top left: matcha, lemongrass and ginger, white tea and strawberry, and chai and almond.
Nowhere is that better evidenced than in their tea cookies, delicate one bite sweets. They are easy on the eyes, darling little cutouts in soft colors, a baby green matcha cookie, and a deep golden lemongrass and ginger oval. But the cookies fall apart in your mouth in an unappealing manner—crumbly and dusty, and while not too sweet, they also don't carry much flavor. It is difficult to make out the tea, much less the strawberry element in the white tea and strawberry. Chai almond was the single most memorable cookie of the set, a crisp and buttery spiced chai tea infused number with finely chopped almonds.
"Precious," is the first word that comes to mind upon entering How Sweet It Is, a catering kitchen turned bakery by co-owners Beth Pilar and Ellen Sternau. Less than a year old, the bakery is a welcome addition to a neighborhood once dominated (bakery-wise, that is) by Sugar Sweet Sunshine. As delicious as endless helpings of Sugar Sweet Sunshine's banana pudding and red velvet cupcakes may sound, sometimes you need something a little different, perhaps a bit refined.
Torrone bar and meringue cookie.
And that's when you head straight to the doors of How Sweet It Is, the tiniest of bakeries with tiny pastries to match. They pay as much attention to decor as they do to the sweets here, not surprising given Ms. Pilar's background in food styling—white walls with carved flower etchings, a single couch with black and white pillows, and the pastries! A duo of macarons displayed in a tall glass dome, torrone bars arranged and aligned with such precision that I was afraid to purchase one, lest I throw off the balance. But doubtless, we had the nougat, pistachio and almond studded torrone bar, dainty with a light chew and lingering hints of honey. The rectangle was breathless in weight, save for the chocolate dipped bottom. We then moved onto a giant meringue cookie, a shattering crisp creature, the vanilla scented shell harboring pockets of dark chocolate.
Posted to the Serious Eats Flickr Pool by Food in Mouth
Danny from Food in Mouth says the peanut butter buttercream frosting on this chocolate cupcake, from the Sweet Melissa Patisserie in Carroll Gardens, is the best he's ever had. I might have to see for myself....
276 Court Street, Brooklyn, NY 11231 (map)
718-855-3410
We're not worthy. We're not worthy.
In New York magazine's "Best Breakfast Meals" list, Robin Raisfeld and Rob Patronite called the bombolinis at Jim Lahey's Sullivan Street Bakery the "best doughnuts" in the city. That is a powerful claim, so we bought a bunch to taste to see if it was accurate. After the first bite, we found it hard to disagree. The dough is impossibly light, the outer crust is crisp yet pliant, and the filling is so creamy and vanilla-y it tastes like great vanilla ice cream. After the second bite, we have decided to up the ante and call it the best filled doughnut we've ever had. After the third bite, we decided that we are simply not worthy of this most excellent doughnut.
533 West 47th Street, New York NY 10036 (Tenth/Eleventh; map)
212-265-5580
On the corner of Waverly and West 11th Street is a bakery with glass windows and an interior done up in bright pink, the word "Royale" boldly splayed across the wall in white cursive. Aside from the shock of color, the interior is sparse and sparkling clean—it's the kind of bakery one would pop in for a daytime treat but never stay long to linger. If you look carefully at the pastries neatly arranged on the counter and the hefty cookies in glass jars, they may appear oddly familiar. Do a double take—yes, that's right—the sweets are splitting images of the ones from Brooklyn's famed Baked. The partners from Baked have opened up a spot cozily nested in the heart of the Village, bringing with them cupcakes and cookies previously only attainable in Red Hook.
Chocolate Cloud and Monster Cookie.
The cookies are as good as ever, a small but solid selection. Most memorable is the Chocolate Cloud. The deep, dark chocolate cookie looks daunting in appearance but proves deceivingly light on the tongue. Intense in flavor, this cookie is purely chocolate from the crackling surface to the chocolate chip studded fudge-like interior. The Monster Cookie is the ideal solution for those who cannot decide. This type of everything-in-one cookie goes by other common names: Kitchen Sink, Jumble, and Ranger Cookie. A crumbly sweet round loaded with oatmeal, peanut butter, chocolate chips, and M&Ms, it satisfies a bit of all cravings without any one element outshining another. It's solid but not too dense and could easily pass for a midday meal (albeit not so healthy).
Editor's note: I don't know how things work at your office, but around this time of day, our collective sweet tooth starts acting up at Serious Eats HQ. Enter Sugar Rush. Every afternoon, we'll point you to some sweet something—so you can rush out and get your fix. Enjoy! I know we will. —Zach
The Yuzu lime flower from Batch, the tiny bakery that Pichet Ong recently opened up next store to his more upscale P*ong. NYCNosh calls these shortbread delights with yuzu frosting "one of the best cookies in the city."
150B West 10th Street, New York NY 10014 (map)
212-929-0250
Robyn Lee is our resident macaron expert, but even this one befuddled her a bit (and by that, I mean, grossed her out). The "Philadelphia" macaron from the Macaron Cafe in the Garment District. Yes, that is smoked salmon, and the middle is filled with cream cheese, making it a the sweetest of "bagel" sandwiches (yes those are poppy seeds topping the thing).
Only recommended for those who don't mind a little bit of smoked fishiness in their sweets. The Macaron Cafe has only made two batches, but both sold out pretty quickly, they said. You can call and order them in advance or just stop by and hope to get lucky (worse case scenario: You'll end up with one of their equally delicious but more standard macaron flavors).
161 West 36th Street, Manhattan NY 10018 (near Seventh Avenue; map)
646-573-5048
Editor's note: You may know Kathy Chan from her blog A Passion for Food or from such pieces on Serious Eats as How to Make Spam Musubi. She'll now be appearing weekly here with Thursday's Sugar Rush column. Please give her a warm welcome. —Adam
It surprises me that Dorina Yuen's gem of a bakery is still under the radar, by Manhattan standards at least. Perched on the borders of Little Italy and Chinatown, Oro Bakery, with cozy brick walls, long countertop seating and more than its share of quality pastries, opened late January, and I've yet to see a line out the door.
Perhaps it's better this way. If it could be like this forever, then I could continue to stroll in Saturday mornings, like the neighborhood regulars and start the day off right with croissant bread pudding, softly studded with tangles of chocolate and plumped raisins. The pudding itself could afford to be less packed with a higher custard to croissant ratio, but mild flavors shot though with the chocolate-raisin combo satisfies the taste buds just right. If you take the pudding home, make sure to warm it in the oven, and top off with softly whipped crème fraîche—breakfast meets dessert.
Grub Street has an annotated still life with baked goods that illustrates the goodies on offer at Batch, Pichet Ong's new bakery Batch, including foie gras dog biscuits. Batch: 150B West 10th Street, New York NY 10014 (Greenwich Village; map)
Manhattan's Chinatown is a huge neighborhood that seems to be getting bigger every day. Although it's a good thing that the neighborhood offers a nearly endless number of eateries, you may be overwhelmed by all the choices. Where do you go on an empty stomach? What do you order? Sometimes, when you're faced with such a wealth of options, it's best to narrow your focus a bit. This, then, is a guide to Chinatown bakeries. (For our purposes, we went to both the main part of Chinatown—between the Canal Street and Grand Street subway stations—and to the less-touristy East Broadway section.) With at least a bakery per block (and sometimes more), you should never be too far from one.
I have tried many items among the seemingly endless array of baked goods, sandwiches, and pizzas at Tisserie, but it wasn't until I happened upon its 53% Cacao Venezuelan Brownie that I had anything truly delicious and inspired there. It is Venezuelan chocolate to the third power, and it is a truly powerful chocolate dessert.
Our lady in Paris (at least half the time), Dorie Greenspan, posted on Serious Eats yesterday about the French seasonal cake galette de rois. Magically (well, not quite magically, in fact I ordered one) a galette des rois (pictured above) appeared on the Serious Eats doorstep yesterday from the SoHo French pastry shop Ceci Cela. I don't know if Ceci Cela's version is as good as one made from Dorie's recipe, but I can tell you that this is one delicious cake.
Dorie's description is right on: "The galette is really very simple—it’s an almond and pastry-cream filling sandwiched by two rounds of (all-butter) puff pastry dough—but so, so good."
I thought the almond part of the filling would make it taste marzipany, but in fact it was simply ground almonds.
Ed Levine diet watchers should note that I took two bites. Email the Serious Eaters for corroboration.
55 Spring Street, New York NY 10012 (b/n Mulberry and Lafayette); 212-274-9179
166 Chambers Street, New York NY 10017 (b/n West Broadway and Greenwich); 212-566-8933
Website: ceci-celapatisserie.com
As the northeast weather turns colder and Thanksgiving approaches this man's attention turns to baked goods. Of course it doesn't take much to get me thinking about pies, cakes, cookies, and any other food item containing the holy trinity of butter, sugar, and flour. That smell, that wondrous, incredibly alluring bakery smell, is what I live for. If I'm feeling blue, that smell transports me to a better, happier place.
New York City happens to be home to more great bakeries per square block than any other city in the country. Why? A couple of reasons. New York has long been the first stop in America for an incredibly diverse ethnic groups. Many of those ethnic groups, the Germans, the Russian and Polish Jews, the Hungarians, the Austrians, the southern Italians, and even in smaller number the French settled here at different points starting at the turn of the twentieth century. Many of these folks brought incredibly rich baking traditions with them.
During the eighties, however, as ethnic enclaves began to break down and disperse, many of the great ethnic bakeries of New York closed. French bakeries like Dumas, Bonte, and Colette shut their doors. So did the great Hungarian bakeries Riga and Mrs. Herbst's. Ditto for great Jewish-style bakeries like Litchtman's and Grossinger's.
Well, I finally got Serious Eater Adam Kuban to stop at Trois Pommes (it's a block from his house, so I don't think it was an unreasonable request), and I have to say that Emily Isaac's bakery is already a top ten New York bakery, and it's quite possible that it could make it into my top five or even—perish the thought—my top three. And I have seriously high standards for bakeries and a bad jones for good baked goods. Serious Eaters, if you've been, let me know what you've tried.
This is what Adam brought in:
WHERE ARE YOU GETTING YOUR THANKSGIVING PIES THIS YEAR?
I once wrote a piece for the New York Observer advocating the nation skip the turkey, stuffing, and sweet potatoes, and opt for an all pie Thanksgiving meal. A meal consisting of, say, half a dozen pies would indeed be one that serious eaters would be thankful for.
To encourage serious eaters everywhere to take up my all pie Thanksgiving cause I am going to try to guide readers and users to the best pies available, both in New York, via mail order, and elsewhere (later this week)...
Traverse City Pie Company: TCPC not only still makes all their magnificent Michigan cherry pies by hand, but its other pies are also pretty damned fine. If you don't live in close proximity to a great pie, a shipped TCPC pie is the way to go.
Julian Pie Company: Who know that the town of Julian, Ca. is mecca for West Coast apple pie lovers? These guys also ship, and if their pies are not quite up to TCPC standards, they're a close second.
A BY CITY GUIDE TO THANKSGIVING PIES
I once wrote a piece for the New York Observer advocating the nation skip the turkey, stuffing, and sweet potatoes, and opt for an all pie Thanksgiving meal. A meal consisting of, say, half a dozen pies would indeed be one that serious eaters would be thankful for.
To encourage serious eaters everywhere to take up my all pie Thanksgiving cause I am going to try to guide readers and users to the best pies available, both in New York and elsewhere.
First New York:
Thanks to the tireless eating efforts of Serious Eats readers I have discovered a couple of other apple turnovers worth eating.
At Balthazar (80 Spring Street (bet. Broadway and Crosby Sts.), 212-965-1785, the apple turnover is light but still substantial and incredibly buttery. The apple filling is soft but not mushy. The Balthazar apple turnover moves up to No. 2 behind Duane Park Patisserie's in the ELE Turnover Survey.
Down the street at Ceci Cela (179 Duane St. (between Hudson and Greenwich Sts.) 212-274-8447, the apple turnover needs a little more apple filling, though the pastry is mighty fine.
And speaking of Balthazar the bakers there make a mean chocolate cake doughnut made in the same machine the late, great Dreesen's Market.
A good apple turnover, like a good man, is hard to find. We're talking seriously good here: flaky, moist, buttery pastry, just firm enough, not too sweet, apples that have been cooked and carmelized before fill the pastry, and-this is key-the right ratio of pastry to apples.
Bad apple turnovers are ubiquitous in New York and elsewhere. You know the ones I'm talking about: hard, unyielding pastry, gelatinous apple filling that belongs in a Hostess Apple pie, and that disgusting white frosting that should be used as mortar.
The unquestioned apple turnover queen in New York is Madeleine Lanciani of Duane Park Patisserie, 179 Duane Street (between Hudson and Greenwich Sts.) 212-274-8447. Her apple turnovers are flakier than Robin Williams, and so buttery they would be banned from every cardiologist's waiting room I can think of. WARNING: In order to secure one of these turnovers you must get to the shop before ten a.m. I can't tell you how many times I've been disappointed when I waltz in there ship around noon.
New York's best unsung apple turnover can be had at Patisserie Margot (2109 Broadway (on 74th Street just west of Broadway) 212-721-0076. Nacole Jacam's turnovers are rectangularly shaped rather than triangular. But the pastry is light and crunchy and delicious, and the filling is cinammony and almost tart. I only wish the pastry to filling ratio was a little lower.
Claude,the impossibly French owner of Patisserie Claude (187 West 4th St. (bet. sixth and seventh avenues.) 212-255-5911, is so grouchy I always hesitate before recommending anyone going into his patisserie. I relent every time because his apple turnovers and croissants are so damn fine. Claude did smile at me last time I was in there, maybe it was because I bought one of everything he had out, or maybe he's just mellowing out as he gets older.
I can't think of another apple turnover in this berg worth calling out. Did I miss any?
If you haven't already checked out the piece on the world's foremost baguettologist in New York Magazine, you must. This is all you need to know about Steven L. Kaplan: When he speaks of baguettes he says things like "a global sense of the moment of penetration" in describing mouthfeel; or that baguettes have "had intercourse" when they're packed too tightly in the oven; or, finally, "It's as if the female crumb has completely reduced the male crust to helpless impotence" when he describes a soggy bread.
The problem with the story is that we never learn the exact criteria he uses in judging baguettes. We learn he has a 21-point grading stystem, but we never find out how he applies it.
But the story did start me thinking about baguettes in New York and around the country, and in the last three days I have bought ten baguettes to sample. What have I learned? One is that a baguette from the same bakery can vary greatly from day to day. The baguette from Pain D'Avignon was great one day, and pretty awful the next. This makes sense in a certain way. Bread baking is affected by outside temperature and humidity and changes in both from day to day. It's like pizza. Also, mass-baking baguettes is the ultimate challenge for any bread baker. Any one of six bakers in New York can make ten great baguettes a day. The real question is whether they can make thousands of very good baguettes in a day. Also, a baguette is an extremely perishable food item. It varies in taste and texture according to how many hours it's been out of the oven. A baguette that's one hour old tastes very different from a six hour-old baguette.
This is a long-winded way of asking all of you to vote for your favorite baguette, either in New York or out.
Here are the candidates I know about:
New York:
Eli's
Pain d'Avignon
Sullivan Street Bakery
Balthazar
Tomcat
Le Pain Quotidien
Outside New York:
La Brea Bakery: (originally LA, now nationwide)
Acme Bread: Bay Area
Bread Line (D.C.)
So cast your vote and tell me what you like about your favorite baguette. We're talking about regular baguettes here, not sourdough.
Vote early and often.
Although I have always vowed not to give ELE a bite by bite description of everything I eat, this past weekend I had so much good food I feel compelled to tell all of you about every incredibly delicious bite I took:
Friday 6 p.m.: A fantastic white pie at the Totonno's at 26th St. and Second Ave. Anyone who thinks the only way to get a great Totonno's pie is to go to Coney Island is just plain wrong.
Saturday 1 p.m.: I went with a couple of friends to the Red Hook Soccer Fields, where we proceeded to eat at every stall. The Red Hook Soccer Fields are one of those life-changing NY food experiences: great home cooks from many Latin American countries cooking for the rest of us. Real food, honest food, in an incomparable setting. I will have lots more to say this week on this not-to-be-missed experience, and I would urge all of you to go this weekend to the corner of Bay and Clinton Streets in Red Hook.
Sunday 1 p.m.: I bought my mother-in-law lunch from Bouchon Bakery. The sandwiches (a roast beef and a turkey) were disappointing (rolls didn't seem fresh, turkey too peppery, flavorless roast beef), but the sweets I brought made my mother-in-law amd me very happy: two chocolate bouchons, one incredible nutter butter cookie (or whatever it is they call their incredible peanut butter cookie), and a coffee eclair that was good but not worth the $3.75 price tag.
Sunday 7 p.m.: I bought a first-rate Eli's apple pie to bring to Calvin Trillin's house for dinner. As I exited Eli's I bought a cup of terrific vanilla ice cream and a cup of equally good grapefruit sorbet from Eli's sidewalk gelateria.
At Trillin's we had some amazing pimientos de Padron, small, vaguely smokey and only occasionally hot peppers, flash-fried and salted. Then Trillin brought out the big guns: boiled pork and chive dumplings from Super Taste on Eldridge Street. Best dumplings I've ever had in my life; remarkably delicate wrappers, porky filling with a slightly roughhewn texture, and something that gave the dumpling a vaguely sweet taste.
Trillin knows more about where to find great food in Chinatown than anyone else I know. He is also one of our greatest writers, whether he's writing about food or politics or anything else. "Bud" Trillin is, as I've said before, a national treasure. If you don't already own The Tummy Trilogy and Feeding a Yen (which contains his story on the above-mentioned peppers) them log on to Amazon and buy them immediately.
For dessert, the apple pie, a friend's very fine flourless chocolate cake with whipped cream, and melon sorbet and hazelnut gelato from Cones on Bleecker Street. More about Trillin's Chinatown favorites will be coming in a separate post.
Yes, Absolute Bagels (2788 Broadway, New York NY 10025; 212-932-2052) is my choice for New York's best bagel. A Thai family–run bakery, Absolute's bagels are chewy, crunchy, and, blessedly, not too sweet. They also do not suffer from bagel elephantiasis, which has made many New York bagels into dirigibles with holes.
Absolute's mini bagels are my snack of choice—they're even crunchier than the regular-size versions.
And how could I forget Absolute's $1.85 bagel with cream cheese when I listed my $2 and Under New York City Eating Pleasures?
H & H's bagels are too sweet, too big, and have no crunch or chew whatsoever.
I think the reasons everyone loves them is that they're most often warm when you buy them and the shop's proximity to Zabar's (which actually carries a superior bagel, from Columbia Hot Bagels).
Are there really any other contenders in New York or anywhere else?
My bagel silver medalist is The Bagelry, 429 Third Avenue, New York NY 10016; 212-679-9845.
My bronze goes to Bagel Oasis, 183-12 Horace Harding Expressway, Fresh Meadows NY 11365; 888-BAGELOASIS.
I know which way I'm voting, but I don't want to affect the results. Cast your vote now
I'm on the lookout for the best chocolate chip cookie in the tri-state area. Once I've located that I will expand my search nationwide.
What do I want my chocolate chip cookies to be? Moist and light, crisp and yet slightly chewy, even pliant. There should be enough high quality chocolate in the cookie so that you get some chocolate in every bite. I don't want any chocolateless bites when I eat a chocolate chip cookie. They should be buttery without being greasy.
All right, those are my criteria. Here are the contenders I have come across to date:
Bouchon Bakery: I know ELE readers are sick of hearing me extoll the virtues of the baked goods at Bouchon Bakery. And I will in a future post explain my disappointment when I actually had a sit-down meal there. But now we are talking about chocolate chip cookies, and BB makes a phenomenal one, with Valhrona chocolate, plenty of French butter, and just enough brown sugar. The chocolate chip cookie here is the ideal combination of crispy, chewy, and pliant. 10 Columbus Circle, 212-823-9366
Levain: The Levain chocolate chip cookie, beloved by many, weighs as much as a hockey puck. It is moist and dense. It has no crisp veneer whatsoever. When you finish a Levain chocolate chip cookie, you feel bloated and satisfied. You have indeed swallowed a mouthful. 167 W. 74th St. 212-874-6080, 354 Montauk Highway,Wainscott, LI, 631-537-8570
Balthazar: Balthzar Bakery founder Paula Oleand is the best bread baker and pastry chef you've never heard of. Her chocolate chip cookie are small, light, intensely chocolatey, and are just crisp enough. 80 Spring St. 212-965-1780
Tate's Bakery: These cookies, made by Kathleen Tate (formerly of Kathleen's Cookies, which are now horrendous by the way), have achieved cult status on the Upper East and West Sides of Manhattan. They are extremely crispy (in fact they often come broken in the bag) and have the proper ratio of brown sugar to butter to chocolate. They come plain or with walnuts. They are available at Citarella's and a lot of Korean produce markets. Available at Citarella, Balducci's, Barney Greengrass, Garden of Eden, and a ton of other places.
I have had good chocolate chip cookies from Ruby et Violette, but the one I had last week was a little greasy and not up to their usual standards. crispy. I'll try to get back there this week and report. 457 W. 50th St., 877-353-9099.
Again, this is not my list of the best. It's just the ones I have tried and liked. What have I missed?
With local berries and stone fruit appearing at farmer's markets all over the tri-state area, a man's attention turns to pie.
Real pie, doublecrusted pie, the crust made with some combination of shortening, lard, and butter. The mark of a great pie maker is his or her ability to make a great doublecrusted fruit pie. Don't get me wrong, I love crumb pies and meringue pies and cream pies as well. It's just that a perfectly flaky doublecrusted pie, with the bottom crust golden brown instead of gummy, the fruit tender and not goopy or too runny, is a thing of beauty, and mighty delicious as well.
So without further adieu my top five NYC pie bakers:
Yura: Yura goes by one name, like a rock star or a supermodel. She can get away with that because her pies are so damn good. I serve her ready to bake apple pie at Thanksgiving, and unless you're one of those persons who insist on making their own pies, you should, too.
Sweet Melissa's: Melissa Murphy Hagenbart first became known for her delicious butterscotcch pudding when she was the pastry chef at Home on Cornelia Street a zillion years ago. She started selling extraordinary Thanksgiving pies outside the side door of the restaurant around that time, and she's just kept on going. She's got two bakeries now, one on Houston Street and the other on Court Street in Carroll Gardens (it takes guts to open a bakery in Carroll Gardens and not sell cannolis), and her pies are still very serious indeed.
Two Little Red Hens: I know I kvelled over their cheesecake in the Times and their birthday cakes on my blog, but Christina Winkler and her partner Mary Louise Clemens just flat out know how to make great homey baked goods using terrific ingredients and ferocious culinary curiousity and passion.
Mitchel London Foods: Mitchel London is an eccentric to be sure, but the man flat out knows how to make great food. His apple pies are towering beauties, filled with firm fruit and just enough cinammon and sugar. Sometimes his all butter crust isn't quite as flaky as I would like.
Little Pie Company : The place has gone a bit corporate in recent years, and the sour cream apple streusel pie, while still being pretty good, has become a cliche, but these guys still make a mean double-crusted pie. The crust is flaky and light, the fruit doesn't drip out of pie like a waterfall, and the bottom crust is usually just as brown as the top.
I know I've probably missed somebody, but I gotta go.
P.S. I know we all like to think of all these farmer mothers and grandmothers making great pies that their sons and daughters schlep to the city farmer's markets, but invariably I have been disappointed by pies I've bought at farmer's markets. That's why I always say let farmers grow and bakers bake.
Why do most birthcake cakes suck?
I'd really like to know. While everybody else is singing "Happy Birthday," I'm thinking about how that first forkful of cake is going to be dry, virtually tasteless, and inedibly sweet, with grainy icing. Birthday cakes are often so bad I welcome the taste of the melted wax from the candles. I know I'm going to be seen as a killjoy and a curmudgeon, but I'm willing to take one for the team (of passionate eaters) here.
But on Saturday night, at a friend's 50th birthday, we had a killer chocolate mocha cake that could have been served as a dessert at a great New American restaurant like Craft or the Union Square Cafe. That the cake was great was no surprise to me. I told my friends to get the cake from Two Little Red Hens. I've had at least ten different kinds of cake from TLRH, everything from yellow to white to chocolate cake, with every kind of frosting and filling imaginable, and I've never been disappointed.
There are a few other neighborhood bakeries that make very good birthday cakes: Soutine, and Amy's Bread.
I used to love Cupcake Cafe cakes, and while they are indeed beautiful, I have found that over the years they have gotten so buttery that's all they taste of. The Cupcake Cafe cakes prove that in fact food can suffer from butter overload, and I didn't think that was possible.
So maybe birthday cakes don't have to suck. We just have such low expectations for them that we accept bad birthday cakes as a given, and we convince ourselves that they're not all that bad (my very polite wife's solution).
As a result we suffer in silence. Not any more. Join me in my "Birthday cakes don't have to suck" crusade.
It was a week of memorable bites:
The prosciutto balls at Joe's Superette on Smith Street in Carroll Gardens. There's still very little else on the shelves in the store, but those creamy, tangy, peppery, crunchy prosciutto balls rock. And the best thing: They're 50 cents each. I buy 'em by the dozen. Photo courtesy of iheartbacon
The Kobe Beef appetizer at Morimoto. It's one of the first preparations of Kobe Beef that makes me understand what all the fuss it about, and why it may actually be worth the money. At Morimoto it's carpaccio thin and every little slice is decadently rich, meaty and fatty at the same time. I also have to say that this was the first time I ate in the main dining room at Morimoto, and it was a lot of fun: fun to look at, fun to eat in, and fun to be able to actually talk to my tablemates without screaming. They have these great fiiberglass sheets between the tables that really do soundproof the place.
The cayenne cheese sticks at Murray's Cheese Shop. I have had a ton of cheese sticks in my time, but the Murray's cheesesticks were buttery, tangy and had just the right amount of kick to them.
I tucked the last bite of my $2.75 Bouchon Bakery sticky bun into my briefcase, where it was going to stay until I rendered my sticky bun verdict this morning. But I made the mistake of putting my case down late last night when I got home tired and bedraggled. In a flash our gluttonous beagle Brass pounced and ate the whole thing in a nanosecond. So the dog really did eat my homework. But I had already found out that the sticky bun in question is worth every penny and more. Before I dug into my purchase, an astute friend asked how much a cinnamon bun costs at a corporate cinnamon bun outpost like Cinnabon. So I called one of their NY stores and was told the regular cinnamon bun was $3.02 and the pecan caramel sticky bun was $3.78. These facts changed everything. After all, Cinnabon's goods are adequate at best. The icky white icing is sticky and grainy and overly sweet, and there's nothing inherently wonderful about the bun itself, which though moist, is characterless and clearly made of inferior raw materials. Now all of a sudden the Bouchon Bakery sticky bun is looking like a veritable bargain. One bite later the verdict is in. The BB Sticky Bun is astonishingly good. It's loaded with pecans, practically oozes butter, and the outer layer of the bun is as moist as its center. And it's a dollar cheaper than its Cinnabon counterpart. So not only is it not a rip-off, it's a bargain. Tomorrow I will report on my Bouchon Bakery cookie findings. They are making their own oreos.
I just can't stop thinking about Bouchon Bakery. Can a peanut butter sandwich cookie ever be worth $2.25?
How good does a sticky bun have to be before it's worth $2.75? Actually, I'm not sure what a sticky bun costs at Bouchon Bakery, but rest assured it's the most expensive sticky bun in NY. I love sticky buns, so come Saturday I'm heading to Bouchon Bakery to try one. As I previously reported the peanut butter sandwich cookie is worth every penny. It was the outrageously good peanut butter sandwich cookie that started me thinking about what happens when world-class chefs apply their skills and standards to homey items like cookies and sticky buns. I guess where I come out is if they use great ingredients and supply serious know-how to something as simple and basic as a sticky bun, they deserve to charge for those ingredients and those skills. I hear the same comments about pizzerias like Una Pizza Napoletana. Is an individual pizza at UPN worth $18? I think it is, because I know the passion and know-how that Una pizza owner Anthony Mangieri brings to every pie. And I guess that's the point. It seems to me that a $3 sticky bun is the definition of an affordable indulgence. But it does have to be great, or else we'll all feel ripped off by Thomas Keller and company.
Is Bouchon Bakery overpriced? To help me answer that question I have decided to eat lunch at Bouchon Bakery in the Time Warner Center (3rd fl.) every Saturday after squash, until I have sampled the entire menu. This time I had a really good Pork Tonnato sandwich ($8.25) along with a bowl of chicken soup ($9.25!) . The soup was a rich brown color, obviously made from a dark stock, which is fine by me. There were a few inconsequential herb dumplings, some al dente vegetables, and a few pieces of tender dark meat chicken floating in the broth, but I actually liked the taste of the soup more after I had eaten all the other stuff. That has never happened to me before, and I can't for the life of me figure out why. The soup itself had great chicken flavor. For dessert I had a serious peanut butter sandwich cookie ($2.75) that may have been the finest peanut butter cookie I have ever eaten. The cookies were light and flavorful, and the filling tasted like an intensely flavored peanut butter mousse.
Note: All of my Bouchon Bakery meals are being eaten and purchased in the retail bakery and not the sit-down restaurant.
So how were the desserts? Well, it was hard to judge the banana coconut cream pie from the Little Pie Company because my wife managed to flip the pie upside down as she carried it into our host's house. So it instantly became a banana coconut cream pudding with pieces of crust dispersed throughout. But it was really good pudding. The chocolate ganache cake from Soutine was impossible to cut cleanly, but the external bittersweet chocolate glaze was excellent if a little thick, the chocolate ganache inside was obscenely rich, and the cake was surprisingly dry and crumbly. The real surprise of the three was the coconut cake from Greenberg's coconut cake. The icing was coconut-flavored whipped cream (yum!) and the cake was light and moist. I had thought Greenberg's had gone precipitously downhill ever since the founding Greenberg family sold the business ten (?) years ago, but this was a damn fine cake.
I bought all three desserts as research for my next big New York Times piece, which is going to be on neighborhood bakeries.
