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Two decades ago, he opened Baked, a small cafe in Red Hook, Brooklyn, where he mastered the techniques of traditional American baking. Privately, he tinkered with time-tested Italian classics and in 2019 opened Ciao, Gloria in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn — a cafe/bakery he calls “a marriage of my two cultures, through food that’s uniquely me.”
Recipe chapters reflect that synergy, beginning with cross-cultural breakfast goodies such as Pumpkin Nutella Bread and Sicilian Sticky Buns. Cookies and biscotti come next, followed by pies and crostadas, breads and savories, cakes and tortas, spoonable desserts, and foundations such as Italian buttercream, pizza dough and brioche.
I made his cantucci (biscotti-like cookies scented with anise and flecked with almonds) and his rendition of panna cotta, which artfully pairs layers of vanilla custard with fresh strawberry gelatin. Both earned “wows” from my tasters. The luscious food photography combined with alternating street scenes of Italy and New York tempts us to taste the best of two worlds in one glorious mouthful.
Susan Puckett is a cookbook author and former food editor of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Follow her at susanpuckett.com.
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