A survey of some NYC Black & White Cookies

Adam Fields
2 min read4 days ago

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I recently went on a quest with my son to try a bunch of Black & White cookies. We used to live a few blocks away from Nussbaum & Wu, where they made amazing Black & White cookies fresh in the store, the best I’ve ever had (although I never made it to Glaser’s before they closed). Post-pandemic, they were closed and then reopened as Wu & Nussbaum. Their current offering of Black & Whites is not even close to where it was and gets a grade of B-.

This is the proper size for a Black & White Cookie

Some of the others we tried:

William Greenberg: really very good overall, though the icing was a little on the sweet side and not chocolatey enough. The cake was great. Grade: A-

Vesuvio: no longer has black and white cookies, but we had a nice cranberry oatmeal. Grade: F (their stuff is high quality, but they get a failing grade for not turning in their work on the black and white cookie assignment)

As a bonus we stopped in at Dominique Ansel after hitting Vesuvio, no black and whites (as expected), and the cronut flavor of the month was cappuccino (fail for two non-coffee drinkers), but we did get a very delightful double chocolate and coconut croissant. Grade: A+ but they’re not on the register for this class.

Russ & Daughters (at 34th st): really shockingly bad. The entire thing tasted pasty and insipid, and it was stale. Grade: D-

Zaro’s at Penn Station: also pretty bad overall. Even more stale than Russ & Daughters, not as bad overall as that one but the icing also had an unpleasant food coloringy aftertaste. Grade: D-

Orwasher’s : very solid, icing a little on the thin side and not chocolatey enough. Good but not great cake. Soft and fresh. Grade: B+/A-

Lenwich: surprisingly good all around but not perfect better icing than Orwashers but cake not quite as good. Soft and fresh. Grade: B+/A-

Zabar’s: this is the clear winner here, cake not quite as good as William Greenberg, but icing much better. White icing A+, chocolate icing A- (not as sweet as any of the others but could still have more chocolate flavor), cake A. Plus the cheapest one of any we tried at $3.95 and still a decent size. Super soft and fresh. Overall Grade: A

36 Hour Later Test

The William Greenberg, Zabar’s and Orwasher ones were still soft and great maybe 36 hours later. By comparison, the Zaro’s and Russ & Daughters ones were still in the trash at that time.

If you enjoyed reading this, come yell at me about it on threads, blue sky, or mastodon, or check out my other writing about food and home cooking at counter.kitchen.

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