It’s not uncommon in New York to see lines snaking around the corner, even on a scorching summer day, but how often are the patient (and impatient!) people in that queue waiting to get into a French bakery and restaurant? That’s what you’ll see these days outside of Andrew Carmellini’s Lafayette Grand Café & Bakery, at the corner of Lafayette and Great Jones Streets. What everyone is waiting up to an hour for is the chance to score a suprême, the hottest thing to hit the city since the cronut.
What, you ask, is a suprême? It’s a donut-croissant mashup filled with cream and drizzled with a thick chocolate glaze, though other flavor glazes have been sighted. Interestingly, the sweet was first released back in April, but for some reason half the city seems to have discovered it only now.
Lafayette Grand Café & Bakery, 380 Lafayette Street, 212-533-3000.
Expect to Be Carded When You Attempt to Buy WHAT?
Let me dispense with the mystery. It’s Reddi Wip — you know, that aerosolized stuff that comes in the red and white can and is supposed to stand in for whipped cream. You now need to be 21 to buy it, at least if you are shopping for it in the Hudson Valley. The law, S.5151, is right there on the books. As of July 2020, “the sale of whipped cream chargers, also known as ‘whippits, whippets, or whip-its,’ to persons under the age of twenty-one” is strictly prohibited.
Why? According to the website of New York State Sen. Joseph P. Addabbo, Jr., who drafted the legislation, the chargers use nitrous oxide as a propellant, which some people abuse to get high. Anyone caught inhaling nitrous oxide for “purposes of intoxication” could be charged with a class A misdemeanor.
