Momofuku: the latest and greatest in baked goods

After an early Valentine's day dinner, my boyfriend and I went to the highly anticipated Momofuku Bakery and Milk Bar. With crazy concoctions like their salty pistachio caramel ice cream, compost cookie (a combination of potato chips, pretzels, butterscotch chips, and chocolate chips), and candy bar pie, Momofuku has generated lots of buzz in the world of adventurous eaters. It has garnered much attention from magazines, blogs, and yes, even Martha.

A little background on this place: Momofuku, meaning "lucky peach," encompasses a triage of restaurants--Noodle bar, Ssam bar, and Ko Bar--all serving up the inventive creations of chef David Chang, with menus changing on a daily basis. The latest addition--the Momofuku Bakery and Milk bar--opened up this past November as an annex to Ssam. Twenty-seven year-old Christina Tosi is the executive pastry chef at all three establishments, and the Milk Bar is now her home-base. (Check out an interview : she won me over with her winter survival tip).

Now, a little background on me and my relationship with baked goods: my lifelong dream is to one day own my own little bakeshop. I proudly boast having a second stomach for desserts, and I truly feel that dark chocolate is one of God’s greatest gifts to man. So naturally, I had to see what this strangely titled establishment was all about.

For those of you who feel the need to justify spending a little dough on high caloric treats, let me allay your fears. Momofuku’s menu is actually reasonably priced for a specialty bake shop: their goodies range from $2-$8. What’s more, the trip is definitely worthwhile because Momofuku offers you more than just sugary confections, they offer you an experience; Right when I walked in the door I knew I was someplace I wanted to be. Rod Stewart’s raspy vocals reverberated off the walls as the scent of warm cinnamon buns wafted up my nose. At 11:30 pm the place showed no signs that it would close in a mere 30 minutes. Hoards of young trendy people congregated around the communal-style wooden tables, and the staff resembled frantic Keebler elves, rushing around with flushed cheeks to fill our orders. The layout of Momofuku is especially cool because the kitchen is open to the dining area, so you can watch the bakers as they work the batter with their burn-marked arms.

So now, on to the food. Being the highly indecisive person that I am, I wanted to try something from every section of the menu, and then some. (I should suggest adding a tasting platter to their menu.) I finally settled on this:

Yup, the candy bar pie. It was a-maz-ing. Sweet and salty, the dense little slice packs in a healthy dose of chocolate, peanut butter, caramel, and toffee bits all neatly enclosed in a cookie crust, topped with a layer of milk chocolate and pretzels. I ate this on a full stomach and I still craved more. Gus opted for the Dulce de Leche cake, a three-layered mammoth of a slice, which I thought was good but kind of dry and much less exciting, and a cup of cereal milk to wash it all down (which, oddly enough, tasted exactly like cereal milk). We also got a compost cookie and a blueberry cream cookie (they were all out of the peanut butter), which we have yet to try.

My tip: Save some money by dining in and make Momofuku Bakery and Milk Bar your destination for the night--you’ll definitely spend less than you would if you went out for dinner or to a bar for a few drinks.

My recommendation: Candy Bar Pie

Next Item to try: Banana cookie

Location: 207 Second Avenue (on 13th St)

Price range: $2-$8

Because the "About Me" is limited to 1200 characters...

Here's a little background on my background, why I'm starting this blog, and what you can expect to find here:

My red hair, freckles, and petite frame belie my rich Italian heritage and consequent deeply-entrenched love of food. I grew up eating delicious home-cooked meals every single night with my family at the dining room table. I wasn’t admonished with “don’t chew with your mouth open” or “that’s not the way you hold your fork,” but with lessons in wine pairing and thoughtful analysis in whether the sauce had enough salt.

Just like most kids, I thought I was like everyone else. I thought everyone grew up eating Pecorino Romano. I thought most parents kept gardens and jarred their own tomatoes so you could have fresh spaghetti sauce in the dead of winter. I thought only the bad moms bought cereal with artificial coloring and Pop Tarts with frosting for their kids. It baffled me greatly that someone would be so bold as to eat more than two cookies in one sitting—wasn’t “two cookies after you finish your veggies” a universal rule?

Well, eventually reality hit. I tasted Lucky Charms, boxed brownies, and jarred tomato sauce. I learned how difficult it can be to eat fresh foods and to prepare healthy enjoyable meals. I now fully appreciate the way I was raised, even if it set the bar (unrealistically?) high.

Now in my early twenties, I’m living in a city with the world’s most diverse offering of food choices. Having Turkish, Italian, Afghan, French, Mexican, Chinese, and Japanese restaurants all within a 20 ft radius of my apartment has been both exhilarating and overwhelming. I want to try everything and anything. I pick up delivery menus and dawdle outside of alluring restaurant windows every few steps I take.

While I’m deeply grateful to be in such a wonderfully diverse area, city living isn’t always easy. I have had to adapt my eating habits to a hectic schedule, a tiny kitchen, a lean grocery budget, and a vegetarian boyfriend. This, I know, doesn't make me unique among my fellow New Yorkers—I think that description fits one out of every three.

Since I've been assigned to keep a blog for class, I'm going to use the opportunity to share my experiences of eating in the Big Apple with a little wallet. Though this blog is aimed primarily towards "young New Yorkers unwilling to sacrifice the quality of their gastronomic experiences due to a limited budget," hopefully the subject(s) of my posts also have a broader appeal. Comments and suggestions are always welcome. Happy reading!