NYC Area Baked Goods - list your favorites

In a takeoff from the food thread I thought we could compile our favorites in various categories. There are lots of places mentioned there I haven’t tried yet and I’d like to have all the information in one place. Feel free to add/suggest additional categories as well. I’ll try to keep the first post updated.

FYI - If you’re just scanning the thread you will sometimes find more detailed information in the discussion below.


Favorite Baguettes
Jay - 1. Arcade , 2. Maison Kayser
David - Kayser
Ramon - Tom Cat Bakery

Favorite Croissants
Jay - 1. Millefeuille, 2. L’Atelier du Chocolat
David - Millefeuille
Peter - Millefeuille
Ramon - Ceci Cela

Favorite Challah
Jay - Rockland Bakery
David - Breads

Favorite Macarons
Jay - Payard for coffee macarons, Laduree for Orange Blossom macarons
Edan - Maison du Macaron
Paul - Bisous Ciao

Favorite Misc. Pastries
Jay - Dominique Ansel, Lady M (but avoid the crepe cakes)
Edan - Dominique Ansel, Baked

Favorite Canneles
Jay - Dominique Ansel
Yaacov - Dominique Ansel


Favorite Donuts
Edan - Doughnut Plant
David - ?that place in Greenpoint
Jay - hates Doughnut Plant but doesn’t have any good suggestions

Favorite Pumpernickel
David - Zabars
Dan - EAT (Walnut Raisin Pumpernickel)

Favorite Rye Bread
David - Orwashers

Favorite Bagel
Edan - Black Seed Bagels for smaller bagels, Brooklyn Bagel & Coffee Company for giant bagels
David & Jay - Absolute Bagel
Jay & Dan - neither like Black Seed

Cookies
Corey - Levain Bakery
Edan - Levain
David - Levain
Patrick - Birdbath Chocolate Chip
Brian - Milk Bar

Babka
Jay - 1. Arcade, 2. Breads
Edan - Petite Shell
Stuart - Breads, Gideon’s Bakery

Rugelach
Edan - Petite Shell

Custard Tarts
Jay - Neptune Bakery in Jersey City
Brent - Teixeira’s in Newark

Whole Grain
Rachel - Balthazar for multigrain, Grandaisy for 7 grain, anything at Arcade

Italian Bread
David - Villabate Alba in Bensonhurst

Black and White
David - Greenbergs
Dan - Orwashers

Blackout Cake
David - Three Little Red Hens

Strudel
Dan - Hungarian Pastry Shop

Pie
Ramon - Sour Cream Apple Walnut Pie from Little Pie Company

Crumb Cake
Dan - Zabars (apple or regular)

Ciabatta
Brian - Sullivan Street Bakery

Baklava
John - Gulluoglu

Hamentaschen
Yaacov - Breads

Other
David - Chocolate Sourdough Twist at Amy’s
Dan - just about anything at Moishe’s
Brian - Semolina Fennel Golden Raisin Bread at Amy’s
John - Simmit at Gulloglu and Simit & Smith, Pogaca at Simmit & Smith, Date filled Sesame sprinkled cookies at Luna Bakery in Paterson
Jay - mini-Finikia at Poseidon Bakery
Yaacov - la gamelle on the bowery has insane pastries on the weekend only. almond crossaint a true standout, Arcade Bakery for chocolate croissant with hazelnuts

Cookies
Levain Bakery

Seconding Levain for cookies

Maison du Macaron for Macarons

Doughnut Plant for Donuts

Black Seed Bagels for smaller bagels / Brooklyn Bagel & Coffee Company for giant bagels

Seconding Dominique Ansel for misc. pastries and adding Baked in Tribeca to that category (pastries are delicious here, but service is consistently unfriendly)

Also, if you add a Lox category (to accompany those bagels), I’d have to vote for Russ & Daughters – especially for their Pastrami Salmon (game changer)

I love the little custard tarts you can find in most Chinese bakeries for ~$1 each, but I don’t have a go-to spot. Quality and price can vary in Chinatown, Elmhurst & Flushing.

My Portuguese wine rep brought me some from Teixeira’s in Newark for the holidays and those blew away anything I’ve had from a Chinese place.

Ooh, good point. My favorite is a Filipino place - Neptune Bakery - in Jersey City, I’ll post it. They have a full array of irrelevant baked goods but it’s the custard tarts that everyone lines up for.

Favorite Baguettes
Kayser

Favorite Croissants
Millefeuille

Favorite Challah
Breads. Rockland Bakery is good but IMO only when you get them at the source.

Favorite Macarons
pass

Favorite Misc. Pastries
I don’t think there any in NYC worth discussing. Maybe Millefeuille?

Favorite Canneles
Fad food. While we’re at it, lets put “favorite cronuts”.

Favorite Donuts
Dough Loco closed, so . . .that place in Greenpoint

Favorite Pumpernickel
Zabars

Favorite Rye Bread
Orwashers

Favorite Bagel
Absolute Bagel

Cookies
I still think the Tate’s Chocolate Chip Cookie from the Hamptons is a little miracle of bakery engineering, even if bought in bags in the supermarket. It is very hard to replicate at home unless you know your oven just-so; deviate even the slightest bit from plan and you end up with chewy fat rolls or something that’s burnt.
But Levain is fine, yes.

Brooklyn Blackout Knockoff
Three Little Red Hens or their sister bakery in Park Slope (no one else comes close, though my grandma swore that TLRH’s was nothing like Ebinger’s

Black & White Cookie
Much worse than it used to be, but still nothing beats Greenberg’s

Italian
Villabate Alba, in Bensonhurst

Favorite Baked Good in NYC, All Categories (aka, Best in Show)
Chocolate Sourdough Twist, Amy’s Bread. Best $1.95 you will ever spend; unique, perfect and unmistakably New York. The challah twist is too soft and not salty enough to contrast with the chocolate. Got to get the sourdough

And, if you ever get the chance to do so (it is possible, if you have a frumie friend who pays for time), go to a shmura matzoh bakery out in Brooklyn, watch your own matzoh being made and eat it the same day it was baked.

can anyone help me find a tarte tropezienne?
we had some in st barths a few years ago and i know my friends would kill for one if i could get ahold of a good one.
thanks

Huh? Canelé de Bordeaux has been around since at least the 18th century. You may not care for them, or think there are any good ones in NYC, but I think “fad food,” let alone any cronut reference, is a stretch.

Uh, no. Maybe in NYC, but certainly not in France.

Edit: Ha! Sarah beat me to it.

Jay, can you please switch the b into a d in my name on your list? Its Edan v. Eban

I’m sorry, but they are the definition of fad food in New York City. I have no doubt that somewhere, they are someone’s comfort food, but they were unheard of here and now in a blink of an eye they’re everywhere. That’s almost definitionally a fad food.

I mean, if every started eating brioche con gelato for breakfast here, that would be a fad; that the Sicilians have done it forever wouldn’t be all that relevant, except for people who wanted to signify their worldliness by saying “it’s traditional in Palermo!”

Well, the definition of fad generally implies that the thing is popular without basis in the thing’s objective quality, which I think doesn’t quite work here, though that’s a matter of opinion. It also generally comes with the implication of short-lived, though not always. Time will tell about that I suppose.

Putting aside the fact that just because you hadn’t heard of something doesn’t mean it was “unheard of” (my mother bought caneles for us at the bakery as a treat a few times a year when I was little, my husband made them for a superbowl party in 2001, several popular and seminal French cookbooks I just checked on my shelf have recipes for them - just a few data points to refute “unheard of”), if every food that was popular elsewhere but scare in NYC, but which subsequently became more/very popular in NYC constituted a fad, then wouldn’t things like tapas and sushi fit the definition?

I realize we’re talking about your opinion here (though it sounds as if you yourself don’t see it as an opinion, but a fact), and that mine is different. I suppose time may be the only true arbiter.

Funny thing is, I don’t even eat pastries…

I think the definition of fad is something that suddenly becomes ubiquitously popular, then fades away. Quinoa is a fad; so is kale; that both have been eaten for 1000s of years doesn’t alter that fact. (My mother made me Portuguese kale soup as a kid.)

If people are still eating caneles in a few years than we can revisit whether it’s a fad or just a sea change in pastry tastes; until then, that my dad was buying me caneles at one of the few bakeries in NY that carried them back in the early 80s (Dumas) is basically irrelevant to the question of whether they’re a fad right now, which they obviously are.

Also, from 2014:
http://gotham-magazine.com/canele-by-celine-is-new-yorks-first-canele-shop
“The latest sweets fad about to envelope NYC is the canele…”

Babka thoughts? I really like the one from Breads–I tend to think parve baked goods are not worth eating unless you have to. Haven’t tried Sadelle’s or Zucker’s or (list whatever other nouvelle babka places are around).

The loaves of bread that are in rotation in our house when I’m not baking: Balthazar’s multi-grain, Grandaisy’s 7 grain, whatever strikes my fancy at Arcade.

Have you tried the babka at Arcade? It was highly recommended to me but it’s been sold out whenever I go (which is itself a good recommendation).

Cooks Country put together a recipe that tried to replicate the Ebingers Blackout Cake. I made it a few times and it needs a lot of tweaking (use cake flour rather than all purpose flour) but my aunt said the last one I made came reasonably close. I have also heard many stories about Ebingers.

Tate’s is amazingly good for a widely available packaged cookie. If you haven’t tried it the chocolate chip cookie mix sold by Vosges is the best version I’ve made, though the basic Toll House cookie recipe is very good and a lot easier.

re Caneles - just because something has become popular does not mean it should be dismissed. That would mean I would have had to stop eating cupcakes when they became popular, or macarons when they became popular, or molten chocolate cake when it became popular. All it means is that it’s become easier to find both good and bad versions, not that it isn’t worth seeking out the good ones. I was just slightly ahead of the curve on them, Brian McBearty recommended the ones at Bouley Bakery and they became a regular purchase until it closed.

I still remember my first macaron about 20? years ago at the NYC branch of Fauchon. I fell in love and I’m not about to stop eating them because you can find them everywhere now. Ditto for caneles which are, to my mind, perhaps the perfect pastry to match with coffee.

Haven’t had Shmura matzoh in about 40 years but I remember it as being very, very good.

I’m not disputing whether or not they’re delicious (they’re milk-sugar-flour-egg-butter. Of course they’re delicious) but whether that’s an appropriate category in a “best of” list where the other subheadings are, eg, “Best Bagel” and “Best Baguette”.