The Selected Ballads Selects...Coffee and Baked Goods

Stumptown is my go-to supplier for coffee beans, as they have a great selection, they get consistently good beans, and they seem to know how to roast to just the right level. Just about everything I try from them makes a great cup of coffee, though I tend to like the Guatemalan and Ethiopian coffees the best. Hopefully this was an anomaly, but on my last trip to the Ace Hotel location, I had a hard time finding any beans roasted most recently than a week before. I feel a little silly even mentioning this, but Stumptown has spoiled me with their usually dependable freshness (often selling beans roasted the previous day), and after all, the beans only have to make it from Red Hook to the Flatiron. When I see Stumptown for sale in Brooklyn stores like Union Market and Blue Apron, it's much more common to see that they've been sitting around for a week or two.

After running out of my last bag of Stumptown beans, I decided to give Gorilla Coffee another try. I'd written their coffee off as overroasted, with the consistently heavy hand on the roaster eliminating flavor differences between single-source beans from different parts of the world, but based on the Guatemalan beans I just bought from them, they seem to have eased up, much to the coffee's benefit. After only one cup, I can't judge the new-and-improved Gorilla yet, but if I was going to name some honorable mentions behind Stumptown, the first two that come to mind are La Colombe, the Philly roaster that now has cafes in Manhattan, and Blue Bottle, the San Fran "microroaster" with a Williamsburg location. Blue Bottle is probably Stumptown's nearest competitor in quality and attention to detail in their cafe - they've been getting serious with their baked goods lately and they serve NYC's best (and possibly most expensive) iced coffee. La Colombe takes a different (Italian-influenced) approach, focusing on blending rather than single-source coffee, and roasting darker across the board. Though I tend to like lighter roasts than the typical La Colombe coffee, they seem to really know what they're doing, and if I'm in the mood to switch things up with a darker roast, I'll go with one of their blends. Intelligentsia beans (from Chicago), some of the best in the country, are available at a couple places in NYC, but haven't been fresh when I've looked at them as I don't think they're being roasted locally. I'll pick up a bag next time I'm in Chicago.

[Update: good piece on Stumptown here - "the Jesus Christ of caffeinated beverages"]
---------------

For me, the undisputed king of NYC bakeries is still Almondine - their bread is the best (they wisely stick to a few basic French styles that they've mastered, rather than trying to be everything to everybody) and they can contend with anyone in the pastry and cake department (I was very fortunate to receive some of Almondine's superb macarons as a gift recently). Grandaisy is not far behind, though, and may be the best bakery in Manhattan, also very strong in both bread and sweet stuff (my observations are based on the W 72nd St location). In Brooklyn, Marlow & Sons, though only having a small pastry case at the front of the restaurant, produces consistently excellent scones, biscuits, and the like. I also tried Peels on the Bowery for the first time recently, and the two items I got (a biscuit and a banana donut) were enough to convince me of its potential elite baked goods status.


Venturing into still sweeter realms, I was in Yorkville for the first time in some time over the weekend and stopped in at Two Little Red Hens. I was glad to be reassured that it's still the place to go for unpretentious and unashamedly sweet and rich desserts - cookies, lemon (or lime-coconut) bars, cakes/cupcakes, and though they didn't have it when I stopped in, the best cake/loaf-style gingerbread I know of. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately for my health), I didn't make it to neighborhood landmark and old-school butter-bomb cookie and pastry provider Glaser's. I need to get back there for what may be the world's greatest prune danish before they go on their annual extended summer break.

On the doughnut front, I've been hearing great things about Dough, the new place in Clinton Hill. While a still-warm dulce de leche from Doughnut Plant has put doubt into my mind at least once and Pies 'n' Thighs puts out a fine product (though they don't taste quite as good as they look - P'n'T might have, to my eye, the most visually appealing donuts in town), I still haven't found any place that seriously challenges Greenpoint's Peter Pan for NYC donut supremacy. I do tend to favor the purity of an unadorned or lightly glazed cake donut over the yeast-raised, heavily-iced-in-exotic-flavors style Dough seems to be working in, but I look forward to trying their offerings with an open mind. I've somehow not mentioned pie in this post, but Four & Twenty Blackbirds in the Gowanus is also high on my list of places to try.

As a final note, I'm pretty sure I got fatter just by typing the second half of this post.

List Making #3 - NYC Donuts

With all the hoo-ha this week about the appearance of Tim Horton's on the NYC donutscape and the impending Dunkin' vs. Tim's donut war (just try Googling "horton's dunkin"), I thought I should get in on the action. And since there's also been a flurry of food lists published lately (Robert Sietsema's at the Voice have been my favorites so far), I figured a top donuts list was in order.

Unfortunately, I've only had enough good donuts in NYC to wholeheartedly recommend a top three, but I stand 100% behind each of them. I haven't had Tim Horton's yet (or if I have - maybe years ago in Northern Michigan? - it wasn't a memorable experience), but I would be profoundly shocked if it was good enough to crack this list.

1. Peter Pan
See my previous donut-related post. Or Google it, Bing it, or Wiki it to find lots of words and photos devoted to this Greenpoint, Brooklyn institution/legend/landmark/temple of donut craftsmanship.

2. Doughnut Plant
To hell with simplified spelling, says the Doughnut Plant! Ironically for a place that clings to the old-school spelling, Doughnut Plant is the foremost purveyor of new-school donut flavors, the perfect yin to Peter Pan's traditionalist yang. The space is beyond minimal, but the flavors are anything but. Dean & DeLuca sells them, but you have to go down to the Lower East Side and try to get one still warm. Thinking about a warm Tres Leches donut from here almost makes me reconsidering making it #2.

3. Glaser's Bake Shop
Known more for their black-and-white cookies than for their donuts, Glaser's on the Upper East Side is the sleeper on this list. After many visits, I developed a favorite breakfast order: a prune danish and a sugar donut. I originally ordered the prune danish thinking it was something else and became an immediate convert. The sugar donut is nothing more than a simple fried ring dusted with sugar crystals, but it's perfectly executed and great for dunking in coffee. Glaser's also makes colorfully decorated donuts in honor of certain holidays like Valentine's Day, but note that they're currently closed for their annual summer vacation, reopening August 18th.


Honorable Mentions

Trois Pommes Patisserie
They only do donuts on the weekends and there's only two choices - jelly and mini-size jelly - but they do it well enough to easily earn an honorable mention. I saw someone mention the beignet-like quality of these donuts, and that sounds about right, especially in the case of the minis.

Donut Pub
A recent return visit to this place (on 14th St in Manhattan) reinforced what I had written previously - the Pub is pretty good but it's no Peter Pan. There's a good, wide selection of classic donut styles, but they're not quite executed to perfection. Still, there's a wide gulf between these donuts and Dunkin' or street cart fare.

Various Polish bakeries along Manhattan Ave. in Greenpoint
Though none can touch Peter Pan, there are some other good spots to get donuts (primarily jelly donuts) in Greenpoint. Try any of the small Polish stores or bakeries (even The Garden market) and you're likely to find a good donut.

Pies & Thighs
This restaurant, located in the shadow of the Williamsburg Bridge (on the Brooklyn side), no longer exists and the one time I ate there I didn't have a donut. It's on this list because I saw the donuts, and I'm pretty sure they would have been excellent. I assumed that I'd try them next time, but the place closed before there could be a next time.

Street Cart Crueller Roulette
Every once in a while, I'll come across an iced crueller (though I've even had one or two good un-iced versions) from a coffee-and-donut cart that is actually pretty satisfying. Dense, sweet, and coffee-friendly, the crueller is IMO the safest choice if you're hard up for a donut and nowhere near any of the places mentioned above.

Eaten Lately, NYC (#3 in a Series) - Donut Pub

On my first morning back from vacation, I finally tried a place I'd been wondering about for a long time, The Donut Pub on 14th & 7th in Manhattan. I'd seen it cited as one of NYC's best for donuts, and the name is an attention-grabber (though I wish someone would open a real donut pub, with a liquor license). I'd never been in the neighborhood when I was in the mood for donuts, though, until this morning.

To render a full verdict, I'll need to return for more extensive sampling, but I think I can safely say that Peter Pan's place as my donut gold standard is safe for now. Donut Pub's plain, unglazed old-fashioned was good, but if Peter Pan's is a 100, DP's is about a 75 or 80. Slightly less dense in the middle and slightly less crisp on the outside than PP's old-fashioned, it made for good dunking but just didn't quite reach the pinnacle of fried dough.

I also tried a biscuit, mostly because I was surprised to see it. It was OK, more spongy than crumbly (not a good thing, IMO), but you can't judge a donut place on the quality of a biscuit. Next time I might opt for something glazed, dipped, or filled. The choices in this realm seemed very promising.

Bonus Links

An '07 article on The Donut Pub

The king of NYC donut blogging

A Serious Eats NYC donut round-up with some great pics