Although I can hardly believe it, I’ve been living in NYC for over 6 months now. It’s surely flown by, but as I dragged my suitcase up the stairs of our walk-up after spending the holiday with my family, it really did feel like home. Since we’ve only got a year and a half left in this great city, I’ve decided to start a new project here on the blog so Ryan and I don’t waste any time missing out on everything the city has to offer. And if New York City has anything, it’s food. Some of the best in the world – including sweets of course. So recently we’ve been taking outings to different bakeries around NYC to taste, review, and share here on the blog. I’m calling it the Sweet Tooth NYC Bakery Tour and you can follow me on Instagram with the hashtag #sweettoothnyc as I continue to eat my way around the city. I think it will be a fun feature to urge me to explore more and to help any of you planning an upcoming trip!

The first bakery on our trip was Levain Bakery, located on 74th St. and Amsterdam. It’s unassuming in appearance, tiny in size, and might be hard to find if there wasn’t always a line out the door! Some call their cookies the best in Manhattan, so I knew I’d have to visit them on my tour and made it my first stop. With a quarter pound of cookie dough in each cookie, I’d say it was a great choice!

In terms of a review, there are no real words for these cookies. They are AMAZING! They’re the size of your fist (or bigger), served piping hot, with a crispy chewy exterior and a doughy center that almost tastes like you’re eating cookie dough. We visited the bakery with my family one day after touring the American Museum of Natural History and ate them together outside huddled together on the sidewalk. So I didn’t get great photos of the cookies as we were eating them, but I kept a few for the next day to document and subsequently devour with some better lighting. Thus, the doughiness of the cookies isn’t captured since these ones below have set overnight, but you can still appreciate their thickness and beauty :)

Although I was sure I would love the chocolate chip walnut cookie the best since I tend to prefer more traditional chocolate chip cookies, my favorite was definitely the dark chocolate chocolate chip cookie. It was so fudgey and chocolately, almost like a brownie, but with the unmistakable chew of a cookie. Heaven! The peanut butter chocolate one was also great, but I loved how the chocolate shined on its own in the double chocolate one. Shocking I know, but peanut butter did not win first prize for me!

The verdict: I highly, highly recommend stopping by Levain Bakery if you’re visiting NYC and looking for a sweet treat, especially if you find yourself in the Upper West Side. Take some time (and burn some calories) on your trip walking through the exhibits of AMNH and exploring Central Park, but make sure to make a bee-line for 74th and Amsterdam because you can’t leave without trying these cookies!

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