THE CRAZIEST CROISSANTS IN NYC
What a flaky thing to do! There’s a far-out new bakery in town peddling quirky croissants in fantastic flavors such as pecan pie and banana-split sundae.
Supermoon Bakehouse opened on the Lower East Side in October with a trendy aesthetic, eyecatching viennoiseries and a cheeky tagline: “Stay wild, moon child.”
The trippy seasonal treats include an eggnog cruffin ($6) — a croissant-muffin hybrid filled with an eggnog-, nutmeg- and rum-flavored cream. Perhaps even more decadent is the bakery’s popular twice-baked pecan-pie croissant ($8): It’s baked once plain, stuffed with brown-butter pie filling and pecan cream, then baked again to a delightfully crispy flakiness. It’s crowned with meringue, candied pecans and confit lemon zest.
There are also savory varieties of croissant such as eggplant and hummus, as well as lox, cream cheese and capers.
“It’s the kitchen and myself just throwing out ideas and being creative and playful, and knowing that we don’t really have to fit into a box,” says pastry chef Ry Stephen, 31, a native Australian who trained in pastry kitchens in Melbourne and Paris before opening Mr. Holmes Bakehouse in San Francisco in 2014 to instant Internet fame. (There are now two additional locations in LA, as well as one in Seoul, South Korea.)
Still, Stephen was cautious about opening a bakery in a town inundated with buzzy bites. So, he became a silent partner in Mr. Holmes Bakehouse and spent two years living on the Lower East Side, working at cafes and as a personal chef, while plotting his debut.
“I feel you cannot capture the spirit of a city unless you live in it,” he says of his decision to make NYC his hometown. He seems to be getting the hang of it. When he’s not concocting ever-more-curious croissants, Stephen, like many New Yorkers, dreams of a bigger apartment.
“One of my favorite all-time things to do ... is get a coffee and look at the dogs in [the park]. But my apartment is too small ... [so] I think of the day when I’ll be able to get a dog.”