NYC Cookies: Petrossian is no Levain but…

October 24, 2008

These are some damn good cookies. Petrossian, the company known for importing Russian caviar, also operates a Cafe/Bakery on 7th Avenue between 57th & 58th Street where they sell three varieties of fresh-baked cookies: Chocolate chip pecan ($3), Double chocolate walnut ($3), and Oatmeal raisin with walnut ($2). Each cookie is delicious, but collectively they still don’t top Levain as the best cookies in the city. Read on to find out why. Special thanks to Sweet Freak for the discovery.

Cookie Tower: Choc. Chip Pecan, Double Choc. Walnut, Oatmeal Raisin w/ Walnut

Chocolate Discs are Better Than Chocolate Chips

Like the Jacques Torres chocolate chip cookies, Petrossian uses dark chocolate discs to make sure there’s fudgy chocolate in every bite of their chocolate chip pecan cookie.

The crisp, clean-tasting dark chocolate is a double threat. It’s fudgy and decadent in the middle while also blending with the cookie edges to create a crisp and buttery outside and base. The pecans enhance only the texture, adding some crunch, without changing the overall flavor.

Double Chocolate Paradox

Levain’s Dark Chocolate Chocolate Chip cookie is so buttery and decadent I simply call it “death by chocolate.” Petrossian’s double chocolate walnut cookie is more like a meringue, with a crisp and thin chewy exterior encasing innards which are simultaneously light, airy and fudgy. The walnuts are sparingly dispersed but when you do find one, they taste as if they’ve been toasted and provide a nice crunch and flavor.

A Great Take on a Classic

Oatmeal cookies tend to go the way of the bagel, they were great until all the good bagel stores closed and Dunkin Donuts took over. Nowadays its as hard finding a great bagel as it is finding a great oatmeal cookie. Petrossian makes a great oatmeal cookie. Hints of maple and cinnamon mingle with crunchy bits of walnut and chewy bits of raisin. The cookie itself is almost cake-like on the inside but it’s crisp on the outside, fortified by toasted oats, the flavor of which tastes homemade and lingers after every bite.