Le Petit Boulanger

This is a little bakery in the Abbeville Village area of Clapham, in south London. It is a really cute place with a lovely selection of French pastries and bread. We tried all three croissants--plain, almond, and chocolate. The almond was a little bit too sweet for my taste, but the other two were delicious!

The photo on the top right shows their cookies, which look a little large--I tend to not want a giant cookie, I'll eat the whole thing, but a small one would satisfy me just as well--and perhaps a little dry looking--but I like chewy cookies rather than crumbly ones, so again that's just me.

The photo on the bottom left shows their delectable looking bread selection. I'll never get over the fact that in England they barely ever use cases or at least partitions to prevent people from touching or sneezing on the food--I think it's a little yucky, but I'm also a bit germophobic. Regardless, that's not really Le Petit Boulanger's problem and it does look lovely and works with the French countryside look of the very small cafe.

The best part is not the food or the decor, but the people. I happened to meet the chef/owner just after Le Petit Boulanger opened a few years ago. He was very nice, helpful (I was visiting and looking for cream of tartar or a substitute for it), and actually guided me to apply to the FCI--I have to that him for that. When I went back recently he wasn't there, but the staff was polite and professional. Overall a really nice experience--perhaps I should go more than once every 3 years.

Popbar

Look at all those Popsicles!

This restaurant, in the West Village, is so cute. All they sell is artisanal gelato and sorbet Popsicles! For a small additional fee you can get unlimited "dippings" and "poppings." The dippings are dark, milk, and white chocolate. The poppings are chopped nuts, coconut, and sprinkles. The basic procedure is: pick a pop, add dippings and poppings, and eat. Ice cream on a stick--what's not to like?! I love the idea of upgraded childhood favorites. Who didn't love licking a Popsicle or ice cream bar pop when they were little? At a certain point you felt as though you have gotten to old to eat them, right? Well with these you are never too old. Their gelato and sorbet are high quality and all made on site. And poppings like pistachio can't possibly be too childish. The staff is friendly and don't make you feel like a vacillating, indecisive idiot when you can't decide what to have. After all there are so many choices; what flavor pop--and all 15 or so flavors look too delicious not to eat--what dipping(s) and what toppings. Think of all the combinations!

Now for the important part: what I ate. I decided to try one sorbet pop and one gelato pop. For the sorbet I had a strawberry pop--you can't go wrong with strawberry--dipped in white chocolate and coated with shredded unsweetened coconut on one side and chopped pistachios on the other. Everything about it was good! The sorbet was intensely strawberry flavored, the white chocolate wasn't too waxy, and the coconut and pistachios went wonderfully with it. The texture of the pop was on the icy side, but it's sorbet so that was to be expected.

Look at the color of that peanut butter gelato, perfection.

The gelato pop was one of the most delicious things I've ever eaten. Okay, probably not ever but at least it's the best gelato I've had in a while. I went for peanut butter gelato. The gelato was creamy and pungently peanut buttery. Not peanutty, peanut buttery--yes there is a difference. It was like eating frozen peanut butter on a stick, dipped in dark chocolate and covered with chocolate sprinkles. Yum! I'm not sure I'll be back anytime though, because it is a schlepp from where I live. But I did have my eye on the kiwi sorbet pop, so I might have to schlepp for that.

Shake Shack (at 77th and Columbus)

Two Double Shack Burgers:
one for me and one for my mom

Danny Meyer does it again! I haven't eaten anything here that I haven't liked. I always get a double shack burger with everything on it--everything being cheese, tomato, lettuce, onion, pickles, and sauce. The sauce is somewhat akin to the sauce on a big mac, but better.

Everything they make is done with high quality, fresh ingredients, which greatly improves the flavor of the food. Nothing tastes like fast food, not even the burger patties which are more flavorful and much leaner than most. The flavor is enhanced by the cooking technique; they sear the patties so that it is sweetly caramelized and almost crisp.

Shroom Burger

For vegetarians, there are shroom burgers. Basically, it's a portabella mushroom that's stuffed with cheese and breaded. I've never eaten it, but I've been with people who have--they both said it was delicious.

Cheesy Fries!

Of course you have to have fries with that. There's a choice between plain old crinkle cut fries--made with Idaho potatoes and nothing else (except the frying oil, obviously)--and cheesy fries. The cheesy fries are their normal fries with copious amounts of melted cheese (American, I believe). Gosh they are good.

They have milkshakes made with their frozen custard. These are very good, but not the best milkshakes I've ever had. The frozen custard plain is delicious. It's basically very rich soft serve ice cream. They have special flavors every day as well as the classic chocolate and vanilla. Both the regular flavors are excellent, especially when swirled with toppings and sauces to make a "concrete". The special flavors, a different one for each day of the week and changed monthly, have always been delicious. My favorite was coffee and donuts; coffee frozen custard with chunks of plain, sweet, cakey donut. Could it get any better?!

There are only three bad things I have to say about Shake Shack and none of them are all that bad. First, the service can be hit or miss, but it's counter service so that's not the end of the world. Second, the prices are steep for counter service. Then again, the food is high quality and it costs less than burgers at sit down restaurants. Third, it's impossible to find seating and the line is almost always out the door; and kI suppose that's a good thing if you look at it from the restaurant's point of view!

Epicerie Boulud

Daniel Boulud opened Epicerie Boulud this past summer. I am very happy about this addition to my neighborhood. Basically this is a restaurant that only serves take away--they have bar height tables inside and outside under a breeze way, but no chairs. It is, like all of Daniel Boulud's restaurants, French food done right. Epicerie Boulud boasts an oyster bar, the DBGB dog from his midtown restaurant named for the famous comedy club CBGB's, some staple French pastries and bread, sandwiches, soups, salads and other vegetable dishes, a daily hot meal, some charcuterie, coffee, and gelato.

I don't particularly enjoy oysters so I can't comment on the oyster bar, but I have sampled a bit of everything else!

The DBGB dog is excellent. It's more of a beef sausage than a hot dog, but that's really not the point. The point is the toppings and the roll. The dog/sausage sits in a brioche roll and is topped with a zingy but not spicy mustard/mayo/ketchup sauce, pickled relish of a variety of vegetables, and sauteed onions. I always get a bag of the gaufrette potato chips on the side. 

The other sandwiches are more along the lines of traditional French fare. They include a wonderful ham and butter on baguette, a delicious turkey BLT club with avocado and fried egg, and an excellent lobster roll. The one problem with all their sandwiches--including the numerous other ones which I have not tried--is that they are quite expensive for the size. I know that they are pricey because they are made with high-quality ingredients, but the mark-up is a bit on the steep side. 

Their salads and cold vegetable dishes are again overpriced for the quantity, but delicious and made with quality ingredients. Their beet and blue cheese salad is one of my favorites.

The hot meal is very good, although I've only tried it once, so I can't comment on how consistent it is. The soups are delicious, both the hot ones in the winter and the chilled ones in the summer. They recently started serving quiche, which is delicious.

The coffee is excellent; their iced tea is so-so. They serve wine as well. I've only tried one or two of their reds and I was quite impressed.

Their baked goods, such as macarons and various tarts, look delicious but I've never tried them. Honestly they are very pricey and I can make fancy French bakery items at home. Their gelato, on the other hand, is completely worth the price. Firstly, it isn't much more expensive than any other ice cream place in the city and, secondly, it's delicious. I've liked every flavor I've tried, unfortunately they keep rotating out my favorites (such as mint chip). The only real problem with the gelato is that some of the staff give tiny scoops and leave off the free wafer cookie (and give you a nasty look when you ask for it) that are barely worth the price while others give nice, substantial scoops. You have to know who is at the counter and only go when the stingy people aren't there.

Speaking of the staff, some of them are wonderful, some are not. The manager (at least I think he's the manager) is snooty and unhelpful. My biggest problem is that I go very frequently and most of the staff never recognize me. I don't expect them to know my name or my usual order (especially because I don't have a usual order) but I'd like a glimmer of recognition--at least they are typically nice. Of course a few people there are very nice and not only know I'm a regular but also as about my mother (she frequents it as well, often with me) and my dog (who comes with me sometimes since they have outdoor tables.)

All in all, it's well worth a visit, just be prepared to spend quite a bit, especially for a place without chairs. 

Macaron Cafe

Clockwise from cut macaron: caramel, coconut, creme brulee, mocha

I believe that they opened a week or two ago, so perhaps that's why the waitresses in cute pink dresses (that put me vaguely in mind of candy stripers' uniforms) weren't quite as efficient as they were enthusiastic. They seemed happy to have a customer (I was not the only person there, so I'm not sure their excitement was justified) but not entirely sure what to do once they had one. They were nice enough (and kept the water glass full enough) to make up for the fact that they couldn't figure out the bill.

The salads looked nice and the sandwich selection was relatively broad considering the place is devoted one type of cookie. I was with a friend and we split two sandwiches that were nice but nothing too impressive. One was a goat cheese, apple, raisin, pine nut, and mustard sandwich; the other was brie, apple, raisin, and mustard. I knew these would be same-y but they sounded good. Both had a very reasonable amount of cheese--both good quality cheeses--and apple. The mustard--a honey dijon, I believe--was very nice. The raisins were odd with the of the sandwich, I picked most of them off. My real complaint was that both of the sandwiches were on the same bread--an overly crusty (and perhaps faintly stale?) baguette. That's alright, I was hungry and despite the fact that I was underwhelmed by the sandwiches I ate my whole portion. Anyway, I was there for the macarons.

Their selection of macaron flavors is impressive. Not wanting to spend to much, my friend and I agreed to split four different flavors. We opted for more traditional flavors, partly because we didn't want to be too adventurous at $2.50 a pop and partly because (at least for me) I like trying the normal flavors to judge the item on its merits before trying unusual flavors that might distract me from deciding if the texture of the meringue and nut flour based cookie is how it should be.

Allow me to make a few generalizations about the state of their macarons before discussing the individual flavors. First, the ratio of filling to cookie is quite good. Second, most of the macarons were beautiful colors that worked perfectly with the favors, but there were a few (like the turquoise vanilla) that were too bright for no apparent reason. I saw no apparent reason, because I'm fine with, say, cassis being chartreuse because the color makes sense...I just don't think you should dye them completely random colors. Third, the surface of the cookies were not smooth. The surface of the macaron cookie should be beautifully smooth, almost shiny, with no texture or color variations. This is easier said than done, trust me. Theirs were very bumpy; presumably because their soft ball sugar was cooked too hot and hardened in little pieces when it hit the cold meringue or it crystallized when cooking and was grainy. This wasn't just a problem with one flavor, it was across the board. I guess it wasn't a mistake with one batch and was, rather, a conscious choice...I can't imagine why. Happily, that didn't mess up the texture of the cookie too much, so it was more an aesthetic issue than anything--although that could be a happy side effect of the humidity of an NYC August, which makes macarons (and most sugar-based things) slightly soft. Fourth, they should probably have a little more height than they did. I'm assuming this problem was linked to the problem with the graininess but it may have been the humidity.

Now for the flavors. My friend and I opted for somewhat traditional flavors, as I mentioned above. We had coconut, mocha, caramel, and crème brûlée. From my least favorite to my favorite:

My least favorite was the crème brûlée, there was something odd about the flavor. I can't put my finger on it exactly--there was something slightly acidic and bitter, almost like verbena, behind the sweet taste of the eggy filling. The filling, at least, had a lovely light and creamy texture to it.

The caramel, unfortunately didn't work terribly well either. The taste was good and the cookie was fine but the filling was bad. They were going for a straight caramel filling, not a cream or ganache filling. That's fine, the problem was the caramel was far too though. They should have made it more of a caramel mou, because as it was it was hard, but not brittle, and so sweet that it hurt your teeth a little. Shame, it had a lot of potential.

Top: mocha; bottom: coconut

The mocha macaron was very nice. One cookie was chocolate, the other was coffee, which I think is very cute, and they were held together by mocha ganache. It had a strong coffee taste but that didn't overpower the chocolate. The cookie was a bit chewy and the ganach filling could have been slightly creamier, but overall quite nice!

The coconut macaron was far and away the best! The cookie was nearly perfect, the cream was light and fluffy and the whole thing was strongly coconut-y without getting soapy (as I find some very sweet coconut flavored things can be). Yes, Laudree's are better, but these were excellent and I didn't have to flips to Paris to get them (yes, I know there is a Laudree in NYC but it isn't nearly as good as the original).

Overall, I'm not terribly impressed by the macarons, which is a pity since the place is called the Macron Cafe, but I can overlook that since the other food was yummy and the staff was nice. I'm not sure I'll go back, there are too many other places I want to try, but I'd recommend it if you happen by it and are hungry.

Francois Payard Bakery

I've met Chef Francois Payard, but I'd never been to his bakery. I decided that was silly and headed over to the shop he recently opened near me. I had heard excellent things about the roulades, so my friend who I was with and I split a piece of coffee roulade. It was delicious! The cake was tender and flavorful. The cream, which I believe was an enriched pastry cream, was incredible and had a perfect, rich, creamy texture. The glaze was on the sticky side and, like everything else, pungently coffee flavored. The macarons were a bit chewy and damp, but they were stuck to the outside of a cake and it was the end of the day.

By the way, the staff was very kind and professional. In addition, we were there at closing so they gave us each a baguette. Obviously they couldn't sell day old baguettes but no point in tossing them, so we got delicious baguettes for free! Very good customer service. I shall have to go back. Plus I want to try the chocolate raspberry roulade, it looked delicious and that is one of my favorite flavor combos.

The Big Gay Ice Cream Shop

I'd already started eating it, then remembered
I should take a picture, oops!

The Big Gay Ice Cream Truck is quite famous and has made numerous appearances on the Food Network. Recently--within the last year--they have expanded from being a food truck to being a food truck and an actual store front. That is excellent news, because it meant I could just stop by one long weekend when I was craving ice cream. I went with my mom so we got two different things and split them. I got the Monday Sundae which is similar to their famous Salty Pimp, but with more chocolate. It's a waffle cone, lined with nutella, filled with chocolate-vanilla swirl ice cream, drizzled with salted dulce de leche sauce, and topped with whipped cream. The way the salty-sweet sauce mixed with the sweet vanilla ice cream and the chocolatey chocolate ice cream and nutella was perfect.

My mom got the mermaid. It is a cup of vanilla ice cream, with graham cracker crumbles and lime curd. The great thing is that the graham cracker crumbles and lime curd are mixed throughout the cup in little pockets between the creamy swirls of ice cream. You think you must have gotten the last taste of that tangy and sweet curd when suddenly your spoon hits another well of limey goodness.

Their ice cream is all--or at least mainly--soft serve. But bears no resemblance to the airy and overly sweet soft serve you get at a Mr. Softie truck. It reminds me of a slightly less rich version of the soft serve you can get in Cornwall, England where the cream is wonderfully thick, so the ice cream is incredible.

I loved both desserts I tried and will have to go back and try more. The oink-wich (as I believe it's called) sounds strange but remarkably appealing and their daily specials look like they are delicious--when I went it was a red velvet sundae, which was cream cheese ice cream with chunks of red velvet cake. I hope that have that again next time I go, because I definitely want to try it!

Alice's Tea Cup

Pumpkin scones in their front case, waiting for me to take
 them home! You see the shine on them? That's the
caramel sauce they put on them. Yum!

Alice's Tea Cup is the home of Jean's-not-yet-but-soon-to-be-famous Mocha Chocolate Chip Cake, which is superb.  Also, some really amazing, non-traditional scones.  If you ever make it there I highly recommend having a pumpkin scone and herbal chai tea; although I've never not liked one of their scones (the salted caramel and chocolate chip scone is very nice) and all their teas are amazing (if you are a black tea fan, I recommend the Margaret's Hope Darjeeling, which is spectacular darjeeling that is pretty difficult to find).  Their other food is good too.  Their BLT on pumpernickel with blue cheese is excellent, as is their tea-infused granola with plain yogurt, which they serve for breakfast and brunch.

The restaurant started out on the Upper West Side and was run by two sisters. Their mother, Jean, made the coffee cake. Once they became busy and successful, Jean handed over the cake making duties to the kitchen staff and the sisters stepped back a little. After that the service and quality slipped a bit, but it was still very good. Now, they've franchised the restaurant and since that expansion the service has gone down hill and the food isn't quite as good.  For example, they are very stingy with the icing on the coffee cake and the staff doesn't recognize regulars as reliably. They are still nice and efficient, just not nearly as good as they used to be. In addition, they are very irritating about not seating incomplete parties (it drives me nuts when the restaurant is half empty and they won't give me a table while I'm waiting for a friend to meet me.)  That said, they are almost always busy because the food is good, there are pages and pages of teas offered, and the atmosphere is so much fun!

Cafe Luxembourg

Cafe Luxembourg is an Upper West Side bistro that actually approximates a real French bistro. Their food is excellent. I've tried a number of different things, and loved everything. Their "Luxemburger" is my favorite thing on the menu, but is their fish and chips with minted peas (the peas are amazing!) is a close second. They have a nice, traditional French onion soup and good salads for appetizers. I've never tried their omelets but I've been with people who have and they all raved about them.

One of the best things about Cafe Luxembourg is their desserts. Their homemade ice cream is wonderful: a perfect texture and great flavors. I also have enjoyed every plated dessert I've had there as well. For more on their desserts see my post, Dessert at Cafe Luxembourg, on my other blog.

The atmosphere is nice, very French bistro-esque. It is often crowded and can be quite noisy--the tables are on top of each other--so probably not a place for a business dinner. Then again how many business dinners do you have on the Upper West Side?

The restaurant is almost always busy for dinner---I highly recommend making a reservation. But if you are like me, you won't think that far in advance and you'll just show up, hoping for the best. Usually they can squeeze you in at the bar if you do that. They serve the full menu at the bar and the bartenders are very nice, so I recommend that option. The table service is reliably decent. It is often better than that, but not always. Luckily the reliably excellent food makes up for any shoddy service.