This is a just brief note to say that I stopped into this bakery (an annex of the restaurant) in the West Village out of curiosity, promptly chose this arugula, red pepper, and goat cheese bread, and was amazed by how good it was — still warm, a little chewy but with a healthy crust, and with flavor to spare. Blue Ribbon, I wish I’d gotten to know you better.

I started off on the Lower East Side this time, for breakfast at the Clinton Street Baking Co. They’re known especially for their pancakes and biscuits…

Blueberry Pancakes w/ Warm Maple Butter. The pancakes were good enough — if a bit heavy — but it was the warm maple butter that I finished… And maple + blueberry is good.

Another time that I was there, I got the Spanish Biscuit Sandwich, with Scrambled Eggs, Melted Jack, Tomatillo Sauce, Grilled Chorizo, and Hash Browns. This was a great way to start the day, but I prefer it when you can eat breakfast sandwiches with your hands. This one demanded a knife and fork, or else each chorizo would be gone in an extended bite and the biscuit would crumble all over the place. I liked how the tomatillo sauce anchored all of the flavors and textures, though.

Pistachio Brownie, Chocolate Chip Cookie, Vanilla Cupcake. I got these to go, but I was a bit disappointed. The cookie was bland (my feeling is that bread flour dulls the flavor of choc chop cookies, and I think there was bread flour in it; it’s usually used to contribute a greater chew), the cupcake dry, and the brownie was only decent and fudgy enough, although I loved the idea of the pistachios on top.

Vanilla Cupcake and Chocolate Cupcake from Sugar Sweet Sunshine bakery. The vanilla cupcake was the best of its kind that I had in NYC — moist, sweet, and tinged with vanilla… that’s all I’ve wanted all along. Plus, it was compact enough to eat in civilized bites, which is an under-rated good quality in a cupcake. All of their chocolate icings seemed to be made with ground almonds, so I didn’t try them — I like my chocolate pure for cupcakes. Unfortunately, the chocolate cupcake was dry.

Then to the Chinatown Ice Cream Factory, at Bayard & Elizabeth.

Black Sesame and Red Bean Ice Creams. I was surprised that I liked the black sesame the best between the two. The flavor approached a mellow peanut butter. The Red Bean wasn’t very stongly flavored — I only tasted the red bean when I came across little pieces of them.

Raspberry Doughnut and Tres Leches Doughnut from the Doughnut Plant. Both very good, if a bit chewy and sweet. I really liked the ribbon of caramel-ish cream inside the Tres Leche, which made it even more moist and cakey.

Then I went down to the Financial District.

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My destination was Financier Patisserie on Stone Street. I had no idea that this wonderful street existed — packed with restaurants that have tables lined up on the street. Perfect for lunch on a sunny day.

Croque Monsieur w/ Salad. Speaking of perfect, I liked the Croque Monsieur a lot — which was perfectly heated and, in addition to the ham, was creamy on the inside and chewy/pungent on the outside. Even the salad was just right - the lightly anointed dressing was an acidic contrast to the creamy sandwich.

Napoleon and St. Honore. The napoleon was too dense and all around soft for me, but I loved the addition of rasperries to the St. Honore and the caramelized choux puffs, even if the choux was a bit tough.

And that was all the food I had until dinner… when I atoned for all the sugar and flour with Whole Foods sushi.

I’m not the type of person who can see a shop sign that reads Max Brenner: Chocolate by the Bald Man and just keep walking. Upon entering, I found myself in one of the most over-the-top, overwhelming spaces that I’ve encountered in NYC. Everything is some shade of chocolate, and most things are chocolate in this 5,000 square foot space near Union Square. At the crossroads of the gift shop, pastry counter, and restaurant areas, you’ll see bins full of hot chocolate powders, a glass-topped table full of truffles, chocolate cakes, chocolate marshmallow pizzas, chocolate bar-filled bagels ready to be warmed, shelves of chocolate candies in boxes, and… sandwiches. There are fantastic pictures here. It feels a bit gimmicky, but it all comes out on just this side of charming — if you know that one thing is true within this chocolate fog, it’s that there’s obviously a passion for celebrating chocolate here.

I kept wondering, “Who are these people, and how did they come to do so much with chocolate???” This article explains that Max Fichtman and Oded Brenner launched it ten years ago in Israel. They sold it to a large food manufacturing company that has been opening franchises around the world. Apparently, Oded Brenner has taken on the Max Brenner role. He is bald.

So, I saw that Chocolate Syringe in a display case.

Me: “What’s in the chocolate syringe?”
Counterperson, with a shrug: “Chocolate.”
Me: “Just…”
Counterperson: “Chocolate.”
Me, accepting the partial truth, and still overwhelmed: “How are you supposed to eat it?”
Counterperson tipped her head back and mimed injecting her mouth with a syringe.

Convinced, I ordered one. I saw someone fill a fresh syringe from a chocolate vat, and he assured me that it would remain melted. I took it home, noticed that I got 60 ml’s, took the topper off, and injected my mouth with that fabulous burst of chocolate. It has the consistency of a slightly fluffy hot fudge (even after it cools), and it’s crazy fun to eat (and believe me, I was skeptical). The internet tells me that the restaurant lists it on the kids menu, but if you ever find yourself here, don’t let them have all fun.

New York is my favorite city in the world, so instead of jetting around in public transportation or taxis, I like to walk around so that I can immediately explore anything that looks interesting. I loosely base my routes around bakeries and stores that I want to check out. When I have a whole day off, I actually like aiming for places that are far away from each other, b/c it gives me exercise and a chance for my palate and stomach to relax between tastings.

So, today, as I often do, I started off with a cupcake in mind…

Buttercup Bake Shop, at 2nd Ave & 51 St. Cupcakes are everywhere in NY, and I’m determined to track down the best one. I don’t have a “control cupcake” — it doesn’t matter to me whether it’s vanilla cake/icing or chocolate cake/icing because I theoretically like all those combinations. I just want a delicious, moist cake with flavorful icing (with conf sugar buttercream — not Italian, Swiss, or French buttercream, b/c I just don’t like ‘em). The most common letdown is a dry cake… like this one, unfortunately. The icing didn’t taste very chocolate-y, either, so the whole result was pretty bland. Too bad. My cupcake search continues.

Banana Pudding. I have a sentimental spot for banana pudding — the Magnolia Bakery version was my big discovery of 1999, and I made it countless times after I moved back to Chicago for college (it was probably the first and only dessert that I made for years); it now also reminds me of the entremet cake that I made in culinary school.

Buttercup is owned by an ex-partner of Magnolia, so it made sense that this was here. This version was very thick — the pudding component itself, but it was also packed with Nilla Wafers and banana slices. Texturally, it was too much for me, like a traffic jam in a cup. I wished that the pudding was a little fluffier and that it had more room to breathe amongst the cookies and bananas. The flavor was nice, though (infused with banana, with hints of sweetened condensed milk and vanilla).

Then, on to Fauchon, at Park & 57th St, whose hot pinkness can be seen from blocks away. They only had a few pastries out at about 10:45, so I got these two petit fours and walked to the plaza in front of FAO Schwartz, at 5th Ave & 58th St, to eat them.

The Pistachio Eclair was pretty bland (tasted of… sugar) and oddly dry yet chewy. Maybe it was old.

The Key Lime Tart had an initial creamy flash of lime that dissipated into an eggy taste; the lime almost, but never quite took off. I think that the construction is really interesting, though — it looked like that sphere was formed by joining two hemispheres of molded curd. I think it would have been even better if it had been on a crust that really showed off its roundness, rather than this slightly larger round one — the curd was off-centered and looked like it was in baggy clothes when it should have been svelte. It would be good to try to smooth the seam a little more, too.

I’ve had these caramels before, and they’re rich, chewy, and flavorful; I could only wish that they included their salted caramels in the box, too. I didn’t have any today, though, b/c yes, Chad, they’re for you.

Then through Central Park and this gazebo to get to the southwest corner of the park…

And to Bouchon Bakery in the Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle. I’ve been there a couple times and will write a full post about it later, but here’s a grape tart that I had there today as a preview…

And then I walked up the Upper West Side on Broadway. I wandered around Fairway, at 74th St, a bustling gourmet grocery market with an especially fabulous outdoor produce display.

Then I happened upon Beard Papa Sweets Cafe, at 76th St, which I vaguely remembered reading about — there are a few of these Japanese chain stores around NY and they’re known for their cream puffs, so I got an Earl Grey Milk Tea one (the other choice was vanilla)…

Light and crispy (very admirable on such a humid day as today), with a smooth pastry cream inside that not only had a balanced sweet Earl Grey flavor, but also had a hint of a lemon tang. And it’s just me, but I don’t like the way that conf sugar and choux pastry taste together, though, so that was my only issue with this.

And then found myself in front of H & H Bagels, and got a just-perfectly-chewy sesame bagel, which was the closest thing that I had to a lunch…

And then to the wonderful Zabar’s. After browsing the grocery section, I spent a lot of time upstairs, inspecting and collecting baking paraphernalia, like tart tins, a food mill, magi-cake strips, silicone cake pan liners, a triple sifter, and some miscellaneous, which I squeezed into my backpack before pointing myself back downtown.

I noticed Ottomanelli Bros, at Amsterdam & 78th St, and was excited b/c I was at a dinner party last night where I was served an amazing New York strip steak from Ottomanelli. But I’ve since found out that that steak came from Ottomanelli Brothers at York & 82nd St. There’s also an Ottomanelli Meat Market in the West Village. I can’t tell if they’re related.

And then I just walked a lot — down to NY Cake & Baking Distribution, at 26th St & 5th Ave. They have everything that people who enjoy decorating cakes would need, and I was interested to see that they have gelatin sheets, acetate, and glucose for sale.

And then into the 18 miles of books lining the shelves of The Strand, at Broadway & 12th St. A while later, I came outside with Cakes by Maida Heatter and The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion — b/c soon I’ll be back in Napa and eager to bake on my own.
Then I read for a while before dinner at Sapa, at 6th Ave & 24th St. I got a ride home, and I admit that was fine with me at that point. I’ll post about the actual meal later.

I was too full from lunch that day to get any pastries from Riederer, so instead, I just took a ton of pictures…

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