Baker, Cook, Writer, Pursuer of Gastronomic Joy

Schmackary’s

I love frosting. It’s smooth, it’s moldable, it has a possibility for killer flavor (which can be missed by making it too much of a grainy sugar-bomb), and it goes with everything: cake, ice cream (yes! ice cream! Have you ever had ice cream that has icing ripples in it? Or just put some globs on your sundae? No? You’re missing out.), brownies, and one of my favorites – cookies. Now not necessarily every cookie is meant for, or would be enhanced by frosting. I would not add anything more to those Levain cookies. A nice and rocky oatmeal scotchy does not have a texture that would mix well. But for the most part, frost a cookie and I am there.

This is one of the things that excited me about Schmackary’s. So many different cookie flavors, and so many of them are frosted! So when I found myself in midtown for another free show and Schmackary’s was the next block over, I knew I had to bop over and try them out. I picked up my ticket for The Waverly Gallery (Elaine May was awe-inspiring and a must see performance in my opinion), and ran over to the cookie establishment on a pre-show sweet treat mission.

The inside was quainter than I expected of the famous brand. I thought that such a big name would have a large interior to match, but it had all the makings of a cute little bake shop. I can’t imagine being in there when it was crowded, but with only a couple others in the shop it was perfectly comfortable. I decided that the best course of action was one seasonal cookie, and one of their intriguing regular flavors. With this in mind I went with their pumpkin spice, and sch’mores flavors. They quickly and efficiently took my order and I had cookies in hand in seconds.

Visually they were stunning. The pumpkin cookie had some icing swirled on the top and the sch’mores cookie had some perfectly torched marshmallow. Absolutely picture perfect. The smell of both were intensely sugary, exactly like one remembers a childhood sugar binge. My first taste into the pumpkin spice was just that. A barrage of sugar came in and rested on the front of my palate. The texture of the cookie was soft, yet not chewy or doughy. It almost crumbled into my mouth with not much integrity to savor. While there were some bursts of flavor coming from the occasional cranberry (I am not normally a fruit-in-cookies sort of person, but this was welcome as it was very ‘tis-the-season) the cookie was not actually very spiced. And while the texture of the icing was of good cookie-icing quality, it also did not have the flavor of autumnal spices I was looking for. As the scent suggested, it was mostly a punch of sugar, with not much in terms of base flavors.

The sch’mores cookie was interesting texturally. Upon biting down on the cookie, with a similarly crumbly texture to the pumpkin spice, the cookie became incorporated into the marshmallow topping in a perfect s’mores fashion. The unfortunate part about this is that I never quite got a good taste of the cookie. I tried to remedy this by taking a piece of the cookie off the side and tasting it on its own. I was not met with the graham cracker flavor that I was hoping for, but again found a surprising lack of flavor. I was also not hit with gooey chocolate-ness (a technical term) until a couple bites in, and even then both the cookie and the chocolate chips were eaten up by the marshmallow. I appreciated this, in a way, because it is true to the way one experiences a real s’more: the marshmallow will often be the most explosive element, as it is the biggest, puffiest, and stickiest. And while I did not have much of a problem with the chocolate experience, I was really looking forward to more of a graham cracker taste in the cookie. I think the true taste of graham cracker is one that is often lost on s’mores flavored things, the mallow and chocolate pairing being the star of the show, but graham cracker is a flavor that I look forward to the most. Of course I am one who grew up having the occasional (okay, maybe more than occasional) bowl of graham crackers and milk for breakfast, so maybe I’m a little more cracker crazy than the typical customer. But if one is going to commit to making a s’mores inspired treat, I want to get all the elements of the s’more! One thing that was a pleasant surprise about the cookie, however, was the sensation of drinking a thick milkshake it gave me. I think something about the way the mallow played with the cookie gave me the sensation of drinking a thick cookies and creme milkshake.

All in all, I felt that my cookie fix was filled, but not in any remarkable fashion. While there is a great variety of flavors and types of products at Schmackary’s, the two I tried were not outstanding in their field. I have had pumpkin spice cookies with more taste of the season, and I have had s’mores cookies that gave me a more well-rounded s’mores experience. That being said, if you’re looking to get a major sugar fix, Schmackary’s has got your back.