A little piece of Paris

Macarons, macarons…



Does the beautiful, speckled passion fruit specimen look familiar?

It should. Bosie Tea Parlor’s pastry chef, Damien Herrgott, worked at Pierre Hermé for four years. And you can sample his masterful baking skills in our fair city.

While Herrgott has been in New York for seven years, Bosie’s only been open for about eight months. A peek inside their pastry display, and you’d swear you were back in Paris.

Éclairs and the mighty Ispahan…


Darjeeling tartes and citron tartes…

Pear walnut tartes and, voila, the Paris Brest.


I finally got a taste of Bosie when I had lunch and sweets with one of my favorite pastry chefs, Pichet Ong.

Pichet let me pick, so of course I got two of the richest desserts available.

The eclipse: a heavenly mix of chocolate sabayon, chocolate ganache and salted white chocolate atop a dark chocolate cookie with fleur de sel.


And the Paris Brest: choux pastry piped full of thick, rich hazelnut cream.


Some days are just more heavenly than others.

Super tarte tatin

Because I really do love Buvette so, so much, I thought it worth double-blogging about it. Especially the tarte tatin.

It's a feat, really. So dense, a titch gooey, and yet seemingly healthy.

Balanced between sweet and savory just so.

Created on the lighted bed of pastry dough. And topped with a dollop of fresh crème anglaise.

I mean, really, what's not to love??

Breakfast club at Locande Verde

I love breakfasting with Ben. We eat so well together.

After our stellar pastry basket at Morandi, there was no way we weren't getting the "pastry mista" at Locande Verde.





From display of such delights as orange chocolate chip scones, cranberry spice bread, apple cider doughnuts and more, we made our selection of three.


Olive oil cake. Still warm. Moist with a beautiful nutty-sweet crust.


A polenta blueberry muffin. Savory and light with bright berries.


And the rich and lovely chocolate cinnamon roll. Every bit as delicious as it looks.


All gone too quickly.

Who does this kid think he is?

Just 24-years-old and Shaineal Shah is running his own chocolate boutique, Xocolatti.

He handcrafts his truffles up north—in Westchester County, where he’s from.

But he’s playing with the big wigs (he had the audacity to open not even two blocks away from Kee’s—which just so happen to be his mom’s favorite chocolates).

From elegant and classic…


… to playful and punchy…

...the truffle flavors are seductive and the designs, gorgeous.

So is the boutique. Working out of a closet-sized space, Shah cleverly designed the walls to incorporate les ballotins (the boxes).

I’ve been lamenting how thin the chocolate scene in New York is. Hopefully Shah will become a choco-superstar and others aren’t far behind…

Lovely little cakes

Bien sur, the chocolates in Brussels were divine. But so were the cakes—at least the ones I had from Saint-Aulaye.

The very charming owner of this French patisserie in Ixelles, Jean-Louis Barré, was proud of his offerings. Not only the chocolates created in-house by Belgian Chocolate Master Ryan Stevenson, but the traditional tarts and gateaux as well.

With good reason.




He boasted that the bakery uses more butter in their croissants than any other bakery in Brussels. As I was there in the afternoon, I didn’t sample any veinnoiserie. But I took home (and shamelessly annihilated) a few cakes, including…

The Mikado: Chocolate mousse with roasted pecan nuts, on a thick chocolate brownie layer with Guérande rock salt.

And The Vegas: Dark chocolate mousse with caramel cream and roasted hazelnut biscuit.

I think the case for visiting Brussels is pretty clear, n'est-ce pas??

Cupcakes in San Francisco

Sure enough, cupcakeries have also taken over San Francisco.

SusieCakes was the most like Magnolia and Billy’s.


Uber sweet frosting, slathered on generously and dusted with sprinkles or other sugary bits.


American Cupcake had its own things going on, with a poppy sensibility, perfectly formed frosting toppers and fun flavors.




And then there’s darling Miette.

Cute and perfect.


When I'm back in the spring, I'm hitting up Cako Bakery and Kara's Cupcakes.