Robicelli's

Everyone loves Robicelli’s brownies. Especially this squirrel.

Place Your Easter Order Now!

AWWWWWWWW!

Unbelievably Easter is already upon us, regardless if it’s snowing or freezing or polar bears take over NYC as we know it.  We’re taking orders for Easter cupcakes, whoopie pies and brownies til Thursday evening, and making delivery throughout Brooklyn & Manhattan this Saturday. Place your order now!

Robicelli's Named Top 10 Dish at Choice Eats!

Photo by Daniel Krieger of First We Feast

It means a lot just to be invited to The Village Voice’s Choice Eats in the first place, as only the best of the best in all of New York City are invited, and we’ve been there three years running. An honor just to be in the same room as the rest of these guys, and then on top of that, to be named one of the best bites of the entire night by so many writers- we can’t tell you how much that means to us.

Though we appreciate every single review, this may be one of my favorites that has ever been written. Thank you to DJ Dieselboy from First We Feast-  and Matt appreciates the love!

If you didn’t get to go to Choice Eats this year and try our Brooklyn Brown Ale Brownie, you can order them on our online store for delivery to your doorstep anywhere in the lower 48 states. 

Also thanks to Eat This NY, Blondie & Brownie, Brooklyn Based, and anyone we may have missed. And thanks to everyone who stopped by our table and spent time with us! We love feeding you guys!

It’s a brand new month, which means…….IT’S FANY FEBRUARY!

Maybe you don’t know what Fany February is- particularly since I made it up. But it’s super awesome! Promise!

Many of you here in NYC know Fany Gerson as the owner of La Newyorkina, maker of the best paletas (aka Mexican ice pops) on earth. Some of you around the country as the author of My Sweet Mexico, one of the greatest cookbooks ever written. Matt and I know her as a good friend, and one of the most wonderful, generous people we have ever known.

We used to share a kitchen with Fany, but last year she moved to Red Hook. And when Sandy came, it destroyed everything in her kitchen. She has two of these gigantic machines that allow her to make and freeze the paletas- without them, she’s only be able to prepare a small amount of product every day (that is, if Sandy hadn’t also destroyed her freezers). Each of those machines cost over $20,000. They also come from Argentina, so the freight costs are significant. Both machines were completely submerged by saltwater and were irreparably destroyed.

Fany ran a successful Kickstarter and has been working her ass off to get her company back to where it was, but to be honest, she’s just trying to get back up and running. As someone who’s been her friend for years, this girl has put EVERYTHING into La Newyorkina- blood, sweat, tears, lost sleep (LOTS of lost sleep)- and there is no reason she needs to be finding ways to just squeak by by the skin of her teeth because the insurers are finding creative ways to deny her claims, no reason why she should be sitting home with her fingers crossed that her FEMA loans will be approved and she’ll be able to get back to business as usual.

And hopefully, she won’t have a reason. Because Fany has a lot of friends who love her very, very much. 

Starting today and continuing til the end of the month, we are donating a chunk of the profits of our Fany brownie directly to the lovely Ms. Gerson (and yes, this brownie was named after her). It’s our dark chocolate brownie base spiked with Mexican cinnamon, swirled with sweet sexy cajeta. You can order them online in both 4 and 12 packs- get some for yourself to store in the freezer for any time you need a quick hit of chocolate, or send some to someone you love for Valentine’s Day or Lincoln’s Birthday.

And that’s not all! It wouldn’t be warranted for us to declare this Fany February if it was just little old us- LOTS of her friends are pitching in to help our girl out! Here’s who’s signed on so far:

Whimsy & Spice: Portion of the profits from their whisky cookie (Fany’s favorite)

Danny Macaroons: Special dulce de leche macaroon available at select locations

Liddabit Sweets: Portion of all profits from items sold at the Brooklyn Flea

Butter & Scotch: Portion of profits from Mexican Chocolate at Brooklyn Flea

Roni Sue’s Chocolates: 50% of the Chili Lover’s Collection

Brooklyn Cured: Portion of profits from the Park Slope Farmer’s Market

We’ll be adding more friends as people return my emails- if you’d also like to be a part of Fany February, shoot me an email at allison at robicellis.com and I’ll add you to the master list up top! And I’ll make sure everyone on Twitter knows about it!

And now off brownies, and onto the cupcakes that are in today’s rotation. They’re plenty delicious, too. You should eat them AND order brownies, because why the hell not? It’s Friday, right?

Tres Leches: Three milk soaked brown butter cake, dulce de leche buttercream, caramel shards

Chai Latte: Chai spiced cake, mascarpone buttercream, toasted chai spices

Ebinger: Chocolate cake, chocolate custard buttercream, chocolate fudge, cake crumbs

Banana Cream Pie: Banana cake, vanilla custard, custard buttercream, banana chip, graham cracker crumbs

I AM BACK! Now you can all go back to living your lives!!!  Thank you to everyone who’s contacted us to check on my after the accident-you don’t know how much it’s meant to our family. 

We haven’t spoken much about the accident or what happened to me. It’s a long complicated situation with lots of details, but the main point has been made by the poster above- my ass is broken, and I’m supposed to be staying in bed as much as possible and avoiding physical activity in order to recover. That’s why we had to drop out of this past weekend’s Food & Wine Festival, why we’re pulling out of pretty much all in-person events, markets and food festivals we’ve been scheduled to do for a good long while. Thank God that Matt, and our incredible staff, are so good at what they do so that the show may otherwise go on (though Matt isn’t sleeping as much as anyone would like).

That’s all I’m going to say about it from now on. Every single second of my reality right now is consumed with the aftermath of the accident, and I’m not going to let it steal any more of my life than it already has. This blog and our company is the source of awesome things in the world, like chocolate and cupcakes and laughter and occasional pictures of cute otters - NOT the crushing misery of broken asses! So let’s get back to awesome stuff!

Our episode of “Unique Sweets” finally aired last night, so if you’re here because of that, welcome! You’ve been introduced to us at a pretty darn nice time, as we’ve got some amazing stuff going to stores today, moist fall-flavored loaf cakes, rich fudgy brownies and, of course, four delicious cupcake flavors from our list of 200+ varieties…..but we’ll get to those later. We’ve got even bigger news today. 

Ready?

Look up at the top of this page. See the red tab? That red tab will bring up our long awaiting ONLINE STORE! That’s right people, we are finally shipping select Robicelli’s items across the United States! You can get brownies sent to your house in California, send a loaf cake assortment to your mom in Texas, send a package of our hot cocoa mix to your daughter in college. 

And the children will love you, too! Think about the children!

Alas- we’re not shipping our cupcakes or whoopie pies at this time. Our famous buttercream is not made with craptons of powdered sugar and shortening like most bakeries on earth, and instead is the fancy kind which is SUPER delicate. In order to ship, we’d need ice packs, special packaging, and overnight shipping, meaning that to get a dozen cupcakes from Brooklyn to wherever you are, it’s going to cost you roughly seven billion dollars in shipping costs. However, our loaf cakes? Pretty much the cupcakes without the buttercream. And in loaf form. And since people eat loaf cakes for breakfast, it makes them “healthy”, too! Until Thanksgiving we’re shipping our fall variety pack: Pumpkin Espresso Chip, Zucchini Pignoli, and Lemon Blueberry Ricotta. December 1st brings three brand new flavors.

Most importantly, we’re shipping the brownies, which are my favorite Robicelli’s item. Why? Because I’m the type of person who realizes she wants dessert every night after she’s put on pajamas and all the stores are closed. I’ll bring home a dozen brownies every so often, put them in little ziplock baggies, then throw them in the freezer. So 11pm hits and I need something sweet? I’m ALWAYS PREPARED, and never have to put on pants to go get whatever sad dried up donuts that are left at 7-11.  Plus, nothing at 7-11 would ever compare to our Sixpoint Brownstone Ale Brownie, no matter what time of day you went.

And if you live in New York City or Long Island? Well, you can just head over to your nearest Robicelli’s retail partner and get our stuff there. We’ve got these sexy cupcakes headed out to select shops today. You’ve picked a very, VERY good day to discover us.

Clockwise from front: S’Mores, Sweet Potato Casserole, CPB, Pumpkin Caramel

S’Mores: Chocolate cake, speculoos pudding, toasted marshmallow buttercream, ganache, graham cracker crumbs

Sweet Potato Casserole: Sweet potato cake, toasted marshmallow buttercream, demerara sugar

CPB: Chocolate cake, peanut butter buttercream, roasted peanuts, ganache

Pumpkin Caramel: Pumpkin cake, salted caramel buttercream, candied pumpkin seeds

Ok, remember how I was a total jerk on Friday saying I had news that I couldn’t tell you? Well I can finally start telling you a bit of it……….

Image courtesy of Free Food Boston

…..BROWNIES! You know- the ones that we kept selling out of like crazy at DeKalb and Madison Square Eats and Union Square…..as of this very second, we’re finally wholesaling them!  (We hired more people to keep up with demand) WOOT WOOT!  

If you haven’t had the opportunity to try them yet, you need to get to this.  Brownies were one of the top sellers at our original store before we closed it to go wholesale over 2 years ago, and were the #1 most requested item from all our original fans.  As you might have noticed, Matt and I are perfectionists when it comes to what we do, and we have no desire to release a product unless we can consider it as one of the absolute best that we have ever tasted (and trust me, we’ve tasted a LOT of brownies.  For, um, research. Yeah….that’s it….research). So until we had enough hands on deck to make sure we could produce these in large enough quantities where the quality would be flawless and none of our other products would suffer- they were left on the back burner.  And now, their day has come! Huzzah to that! 

What differentiates our brownies from the rest of the pack? Ultra chocolatey Valrhona cocoa, plenty of eggs and butter, and copious amounts of melted chocolate.  It’s not cakey, and not exactly fudgy- it’s just wrong, in a very, very right way.

You can find them at current Robicelli’s retail partners Crespella (Park Slope) and Queen City Cupcakes (Patchogue Long Island), and our NEW LOCATION:

Oaxaca Tacos!  With three locations in Brooklyn, and one on Extra Place in Manhattan (you know, that alley behind CB’s. And YES, it will always be CB’s, and I will acknowledge it as the John Varvartous whatever store over my cold dead body).  You can get our “Fany” brownie on their dessert menu: rich chocolate swirled with cinnamon and cajeta from Fat Toad Farms in Vermont.  And if you’re curious about the name, it’s names for one of my best friends and the grand dame of Mexican pastry- Fany Gerson.  And if someone I admire as much as Fany loves them, I know they’re good!

We’re going to start pounding the pavement and trying to bring these brownies to more shops around NYC soon- if there’s a place near you that you’d like us to hit, let us know!  And I am swearing in front of you all at this very moment- these brownies WILL SHIP IN 2012.  Super-duper-ultra-infinity promise.  

Even though we’re letting brownies finally have their moment in the sun after playing third fiddle to our other products, there are still cupcakes that are going to stores and need to be eaten to fulfill their cupcakey destiny.  Back from the vault today- The McFadden! Lemony delicious with just a splash of Pimm’s- this one’s a huge cult classic, and worth searching out.

Clockwise from front: S’Mores, McFadden, Hazelnut Kiss, Pecan French Toast

S’Mores: Chocolate cake, speculoos pudding, toasted marshmallow buttercream, ganache, graham cracker crumbs

McFadden: Victorian lemonade cake and buttercream with lemon, ginger and a splash of Pimm’s, candied lemon peel

Hazelnut Kiss: Chocolate hazelnut cake, Nutella buttercream, roasted hazelnuts

Pecan French Toast: Maple custard soaked cinnamon cake, maple-cinnamon buttercream, maple glazed pecans

______________________________

Cupcakes Available at:

Cafe at Sam’s Bakery:  94th off 3rd, Bay Ridge

Aloha Grinds: 77th and 3rd, Bay Ridge

Bagel Schmagel: 76th and 3rd, Bay Ridge

Crespella: 7th Ave off 9th Street, Park Slope

Tazza Cafes: Clark off Henry AND Henry off Atlantic, Brooklyn Heights

Cake Shop: Ludlow btwn Stanton & Rivington, LES

Queen City Cupcakes: West Main Street, Patchogue, Long Island

Whoopie Pies Available At:

Red Hook Lobster Pound: 284 Van Brunt Street, Red Hook

Tazza Cafes: Clark off Henry AND Henry off Atlantic, Brooklyn Heights

Queen City Cupcakes: West Main Street, Patchogue, Long Island

Brownies Available At:

Crespella: 7th Ave off 9th Street, Park Slope

Queen City Cupcakes: West Main Street, Patchogue, Long Island

Oaxaca Tacos: 250 4th Avenue- Park Slope Brooklyn; 251 Smith Street Cobble Hill Brooklyn; 16 Extra Place, LES Manhattan

It’s time for THE GRUB STREET FOOD FESTIVAL MENU!  WHOOP WHOOP WHOOP!!!

CUPCAKES:

Chicken n’Waffles: Vanilla “Waffle” cake, vanilla buttercream, buttermilk soaked fried chicken dunked in pure Vermont maple syrup (yes, it’s really chicken)

The Ebinger: Chocolate cake, chocolate custard buttercream, chocolate fudge, chocolate cake crumbs

Iona: Pear Olive Oil cake, blue cheese buttercream, candied walnuts, port wine reduction

Butternut Spice: Butternut squash cake, vanilla buttercream, spiced candied pumpkin seeds, butternut squash seed oil

BROWNIES:

Classic with French Sea Salt

The Maltz with Bourbon and Bacon

The Fany with Cinnamon and Cajeta

WHOOPIE PIES

Classic Vanilla Marshmallow

NEW!!!! Pumpkin Spice: Valrhona chocolate cookies filled with pumpkin & toasted marshmallow buttercream and brown sugar streusel

ARE YOU GUYS AS EXCITED AS WE ARE?!?!?!?!

Along with Meatopia and the Lobster Roll Rumble, this is one of THE best food events of the year.  And yes, it will probably get crowded, but so does every good food event worth checking out.  As someone who’s worked on the other side of the table at tons of these things, I thought I could help you all out with this:

THE ROBICELLI’S GUIDE TO FOOD FESTIVALS!!!

1.ARRIVE EARLY.  Grub Street runs from 10am til 6pm.  Several thousand people are going to attend, and they are all going to show up between 1 and 4. If you are one of those people who are shows up during that window, don’t be surprised if there’s gigantic lines. This doesn’t necessarily mean the event was poorly planned, disorganized etc and you need to complain en masse over Twitter- it just means that in a city of 8+ million people, a few thousand other folks thought a food festival with free admission would be a nice way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

Your best bet is to get there before noon, when we’ll all be fully stocked and most of the city is still hungover in bed.  You can also try hitting us up after 5pm- though some vendors will be sold out at this point, many won’t, and there will be virtually no lines. However, I will more than likely have not had a cup of coffee for several hours at that point, so I may be either speaking in tongues or passed out on our table.  Just FYI.

2.  HELP US KEEP THE LINE MOVING. If you’re looking to chat with vendors you’re friendly with, pitch a service to, etc, again show up before noon or after 5.  We really, really, really want to talk to you, but when we’re slammed we have to put customers first.  Events like this are honestly some of the only time we get to socialize, so if we miss you because the lines backing up, we’re genuinely dissapointed. Please feel free to come back when the craziness dies down to talk to us- we really do love hanging out with you all!

3.  BRING SINGLES.  We bring as much change as we can, but there have been times where I’ve gotten ten people in a row paying with a $20 bill on a $3-4 item. If you’re the 11th guy with a $20, you’re going to have to stay on the line while I call people with singles up to the front.  I’ve had instances where people have gotten to skip 15 places in line just because they had singles, so not only does this help us out, it helps you out, too.

4.  DESSERT LINES MOVE THE QUICKEST if there’s a line at all. Since all our stuff if prepared off-site, all we need to do is grab your cash and give you your food.  Personally we don’t want our line to get too long, so we’re going to try to move you guys out as fast as we can.  Tell us your order, I’ll get you your food while you pay Matt, and you can be on your way!  

5.  TRAVEL IN PACKS. Even if you show up early there’s going to be lines, especially for hot food.  Get one person to stand on the longest one, then split up and go grab stuff that you can all pick on together while you wait.  

6.  PLAN YOUR ATTACK IN ADVANCE. Here’s a map!

7.  BRING BAGS AND CONTAINERS. You are not going to be able to eat everything, and you may want to take some of what you order home. It also helps you navigate better- fill up your bags, then grab a place to sit and you don’t have to get up except to grab more beer or pee.  Some vendors will have to-go containers for their stuff, but some won’t.  And please don’t go to vendors and ask them for containers to use for other food- it’s disrespectful if you don’t offer to pay for it.  

8.  READ THE MENU BEFORE YOU ORDER. We want to be respectful to all of our customers by keeping the waiting to a minimum.  If you were at our store we’d be able to spend the time with you to describe our products in detail, but you will need to forgive us at a crowded festival if we just rattle off the names of what we have quickly, or ask you to step to the side to read the menu as we help other customers (we’ll take your order as soon as you’ve made your decision).  We honestly are not trying to be disrespectful- we just need to keep the line moving not only to be fair to everyone, but to keep walking paths clear for safety reasons.

Of course, if you’re asking a question regarding a food allergy or sensitivity- feel free to ask it.  We’re more than happy to help!

9.  BE POLITE AND GOOD THINGS HAPPEN!  Most of you have no problems with this, but I’m going to let you in on a little secret- we may not always remember names, but we remember faces. And we ALWAYS remember the people who are extra nice and make us smile every time we see them. Those are the people who occasionally get discounts, or get a little something extra thrown in their bag if we can manage it, or have us go above and beyond to handle special requests or last minute orders. I’m not saying we’re going to be handing out free cupcakes to everyone who give us a wink, but you DO go in our memory banks, and there will come a time where that pays off.

Plus when you’re nice to us, we end up in super good moods and are extra nice to all the rest of our customers! Then they’re nicer to everyone, and we all have an awesome time! WINNING! 

I’m sure some of you have tips of your own, so visit us on Facebook and let me know what they are!  And come visit us tomorrow- we can’t wait to stuff your faces with baked goods!

GRUB STREET FOOD FESTIVAL AT THE HESTER STREET FAIR
CORNER OF ESSEX STREET AND HESTER STREET
LOWER EAST SIDE, NY

F train to East Broadway, JMZ to Delancey, D to Grand and then walk a little bit

Woooo!  I really don’t think there are words for how tired I am right now.  I have been in the kitchen either alone or with our incredible intern Alexandra for 5 straight 9+ hour days, in a 19th century warehouse that has no heat on the weekends (thank you union guys!).  Tonight I’m having dinner at 2 am, consisting of some leftover Italian bread the kids had with the babysitter and a cup of tea I got from a gas station.  This is the glamorous life of us Brooklyn indie food scenesters!!!

Speaking of exhaustion, totally forgot to take pictures of the cupcakes before I left tonight.  My bad.

The Big Social at 201 Mulberry is running through this Thursday every day from 12-8, and you MUST come down and check us out (and maybe grab some Luke’s Lobster or Pies n’Thighs for lunch?).  Our brownies are getting scooped up almost faster than we can make them- we’re thrilled you guys like them so much!  And our brownie gift boxes are flying off the shelves- they start at $10, so they’re the perfect little gift for a co-worker or that person you want to get just a little something for.  Remember- food gifts never need to be dusted and don’t take up space, so they’re perfect for the person or family who has everything (plus the brownies can be frozen for months, so no worries about them going bad!).

Also, if you want our cupcakes for Christmas, email us NOW or preorder through your nearest store.  Christmas flavors are:

-Hot Buttered Rum

-Cranberry Gingerbread

-Eggnog

-Chocolate Candy Cane

We’ll also have special Christmas flavors on Thursday at Big Social that aren’t in stores.  Remember, ALL of these are going in the vault after this weekend and you won’t see them until next year, so stock up!

Ok, enough of me blathering- onto flavors!!!

Hazelnut Kiss:  Chocolate hazelnut cake, Nutella buttercream, roasted hazelnuts

Chocolate Candy Cane:  Mint chocolate-chocolate chip cake, peppermint buttercream, crushed candy canes

Sticky Toffee:  Sticky toffee date cake, hard sauce, vanilla buttercream, brown sugar sandies

Eggnog:  Eggnog cake & buttecream, fresh nutmeg

Available at:

Cafe at Sam’s Bakery:  94th St off 3rd Ave, Bay Ridge

Crespella:  7th Ave off 9th St, Park Slope

Market:  1211 Cortelyou Road, Ditmas Park

Tazza Cafes:  Henry St off Atlantic and Clark St off Henry, Brooklyn Heights

Radish:  Bedford Ave off N8th St, Williamsburg

Cakeshop:  Ludlow St btwn Stanton & Rivington, Lower East Side

Lily O’Brien’s Chocolate Cafe at Bryant Park:  40th St btwn 5th & 6th Avenues, Midtown

AT THE BIG SOCIAL (201 Mulberry St btwn Kenmare and Spring)

CUPCAKES

Eggnog

Kumquat:  Winter citrus cake, vanilla buttercream, candied kumquats

Sticky Toffee

Chocolate Chestnut

Cranberry Gingerbread:  Gingerbread cake, vanilla buttecream, fresh cranberry compote

Car Bomb:  Chocolate Guinness cake, Jameson whiskey ganache, Bailey’s Irish Cream buttercream

BROWNIES

Classic Sea Salt

“The Maltz”:  Bourbon & Bacon

Chocolate Almond

“The Aztec”:  Ancho Chili & Pumpkin Seed

Chocolate Peppermint