LAMILL Coffee, Baltimore

Another fine addition to the Four Seasons in Baltimore is LAMILL Coffee, originally from LA. While the coffee is excellent, an added bonus is that pastry chef Chris Ford is responsible for most of the items on the menu.
He is certainly fond of making seasonal macaroons that are larger, usually a whopping 2-3 inches in diameter. I've had flavors like cinnamon brioche and red currant in the past.
One time, I tried his dense rich bacon cheddar scone as a savory alternative.

One of my favorites is hot beignets with your choice of dips. I end up getting the Meyer lemon curd all the time.
I recently tried the everything cookie, similar to Momofuku Milk Bar's compost cookie, it's got an assortment of items baked in it. What I could tell was chocolate chip, oatmeal, raisins, popcorn, potato chips, and pretzels.

 

I also recomment the delicious cinnamon brioche.

200 International Drive
Baltimore, MD

Roberta's, Brooklyn

Brooklen, LBT, Jude, and I went one Sunday morning to East Williamsburg in Brooklyn to Roberta's for the the weekly NYC ritual of brunch. Brooklen had been wanting to go because he had tried their pizza at Madison Square Eats events.
When we arrived at the address, at first, we weren't sure we were at the right place. The exterior looked very modest, with a very small sign just above the doorway. Inside though, the space was great with long wooden tables, a red wood burning oven, exposed ceilings, a bar, and where we sat, a garden courtyard that looked into a radio studio.

We had to at least get one pizza. Immediately, we knew we wanted to try Paige's Breakfast Burrito pizza. It came topped with tomato, mozzarella, potato, red onion, jalapeño, egg, and Berkshire pork sausage. The crust on the pie was thin, crisp, and a little chewy with a decent char.
We also shared a tasty sticky bun and buttermilk biscuit. Both were scrumptious.

For our main courses, I ordered the fried eggs with beef tongue, salsa verde and potato hash. The tongue was great, really tender and delicate.
LBT got a breakfast sandwich of a hunk of sausage, egg, and cheese on a potato roll. It was a bit odd that they could not scramble the egg for her.

Brooklen got the ricotta pancakes with brown butter and maple syrup. We shared a small plate of thick fatty slab bacon.

261 Moore Street
Brooklyn, NY
(718)417-1118

Bien Cuit: The Smith Street Bakery, Brooklyn

The squash and quince puree dessert at the "gastronomic picnic" just was not satisfying as a dessert, so we all decided to get some coffee and check out the sweets at Bien Cuit on Smith Street.

My cousins, however, ordered more savory food -- I was impressed! My family are basically hobbits - second breakfasts and second lunches are second nature.  After trying their choices though -- open-faced quail egg, heirloom tomato, feta, and truffle salt on pugliese; and Tuscan-style salami, coppa, Tomme de Savoie, mustard and cornichon on baguette, I understood why - the bread was amazing!  Sitting there, I had wanted to grab a loaf for home, but somehow in the shuffle on moving on to our next destination, I forgot.  Sad - well, for next time I'm in the neighborhood.

The rest of us got sweets - I went with classic pain au chocolat, Redneckhunter got a hazelnut tarte - so moist! 

And Tricia got a cardamom apple danish.

While writing this post, I just noticed that they sell their bread online from the website!  Oh, so tempting...

Bien Cuit
120 Smith Street
Brooklyn NY 11211
(718) 852-0200