Dominique Ansel Bakery – Part II

I try to refrain from blogging about the same place twice, but when I can’t stop thinking about a restaurant you deserve to hear me sing its praises. Dominique Ansel Bakery is my favorite bakery in the City, maybe even my favorite bakery of all the bakeries there ever were. This is huge considering how obsessed I’ve been with Milk Bar over the years. I still love Milk Bar and see it as a close second, but Monsieur Ansel has secured a special place in my heart.

I would like to do anything as well as Dominique Ansel does pastry. The magic soufflé is the perfect example. I don’t know a ton about baking, but I do know that soufflés have a reputation for being temperamental and difficult to pull off. You have to time and measure everything just so if you don’t want the whole thing to collapse. Somehow, Ansel manages to do this with the soufflé INSIDE another cake. How the soufflé retains it’s light texture all while an entire second cake has to bake around it, I have no idea. I’ve decided Dominque Ansel has voodoo powers and that’s the end of the story.

The soufflé part of the magic soufflé is chocolate grand marnier flavored and is encased in an orange blossom brioche. I’m not big on orange desserts but the flavor is not overpowering and it’s not too sweet, which is good because I have a theory that super sweet desserts are trying to compensate for something. I ate the whole thing in the street like an animal and feel no shame.