(Bloomberg) -- New York City has almost as many buzzy pastry spots as Starbucks these days. They all stock an expertly made flaky croissant creation, a chewy cinnamon-spiked Swedish kardemummabullar (aka cardamom bun), an alternative viral-on-Instagram specialty, or all of the above. 

In fact, New York’s boom in line-up-for-pastry places, which builds on the success of Levain Bakery, Milk Bar and other established dessert dispensaries, has now inspired restaurants to get into the game. 

This spring, the chic all-day NoHo restaurant and bakery Raf’s is using croissants instead of dinners as a way to collaborate with culinary stars. Executive pastry chef Camari Mick’s “croissant club” is a monthly changing partnership with food-world personalities: One of the first is a spiced potato dosa croissant with Bengali-American chef and YouTuber Sohla El-Waylly. 

Even places with no bakery have introduced destination pastry programs to push sales during off hours. The casual Indian cafe chain Inday recently released a slate of pastries in collaboration with the Queens bakery Peace, Love & Dough, after Inday founder Basu Ratnam saw an increase in customer traffic early in the day. “People were coming in for our homemade chai and South Indian filter coffee and would ask if we had anything to dip in their beverages,” Ratnam says. Now, at a few of its outlets, Inday has introduced selections like a twice-baked croissant topped with gulab jamun, the classic syrup-drenched Indian milk powder confection.

Other operators cite the power of viral images as an impetus for their baking programs. In the East Village, Tiara Bennett says social media “has been a key ingredient” in expanding the clientele at her compact American bakery, the Pastry Box. 

Hers is one of nine of New York’s most exciting bakeries right now, where everything from scrumptuous raspberry mochi doughnuts to eye-catching praline lattice croissants is on offer. Below you’ll also find advice on optimal times to avoid the lines, and sometimes even get a pastry fresh out of the oven. 

Laurel Bakery, Cobble Hill 

Baker Craig Escalante and forager Tama Wong feature on the team at Laurel, the quaint, European-style corner bakery and cafe that opened in April in Brooklyn’s Cobble Hill. Enriched with 82% butterfat French butter, the laminated pastries (made from dough with multiple layers of butter to create flakiness) are accented with ingredients like wild-foraged blueberries or ramps and Cantal cheese; prices start at $5. Fluffy focaccia sails out of the oven, studded with cherry tomatoes and rosemary or olives and Szechuan chili flakes. (The secret ingredient is the sweet fermented Japanese rice drink called amazake, which adds both flavor and an extra-soft texture.) Another delicacy worth trying is Escalante’s signature broyé, a butter cookie the size of your head.

Laurel Bakery operates from early morning until late afternoon, with a scattering of seats out front. To avoid the customer pile up, drop in Wednesday or Thursday before noon. 

Postcard, West Village

This vermillion-red, postage-stamp-size retro Japanese bakery comes from the crew behind sushi darling Nami Nori right next door. The place features an entirely gluten-free menu. Up front there’s an elegantly arranged refrigerated case stocked with seasonal fruit sandos ($9), raspberry and matcha mochi doughnuts, as well as slices of Basque cheesecake dosed with cultured koji rice, the Japanese product that adds umami to all kinds of dishes. 

Postcard also sells savory items, including sandos filled with fluffy eggs and chicken katsu. They’re designed to be grab-and-go, but there’s a handful of bistro tables for dining in. The menu, from partners Lisa Limb and Takahiro Sakaeda, is inspired by popular Japanese snacks and pairs with drinks like a sparkling melon cream soda, boba-enriched hojicha roasted green tea and Coffee Project cold brew. 

The Pastry Box, East Village

The sign outside the Pastry Box’s modest white storefront boldly claims it offers the best chocolate chip cookies in New York City. The quarter-pound disks ($5)  are thin and chewy, yet still crisp, splotched with imperfect pools of melted Callebaut chocolate and finished with Maldon salt crystals. Despite the demand, the signature cookie never sells out, because pastry chef and owner Bennett bakes them until 30 minutes before closing. Customers can also choose from other premium baked goods, such as the cult favorite black-and-white cookies, brown butter brownies or yuzu-laced olive oil cake. Pro tip: Visit over the weekend to try Bennett’s ever-changing yeasted doughnuts in flavors like vanilla cheesecake and crème brûlée. 

Sixteen Mill Bakeshop, Gowanus

On weekends, arrive at Sixteen Mill early, or be prepared for extreme lines at the tiny, exposed-brick-wall bakery in Brooklyn’s Gowanus, equipped with five indoor bar stools. Since its debut last December, word of Talia Tutak’s exceptional pastries and breads has spread. The pastries are many things: gluten-free, vegan and sweetened with maple syrup instead of refined sugars. There are incredibly addictive and moist baked doughnuts ($9) in flavors including Hikari matcha-strawberry-lemon, wild-fermented sourdough scones and a candidate for the city’s best gluten-free bread—a buckwheat-teff-red quinoa sourdough studded with seeds. If you want to forgo the lines, Thursdays and Fridays are the best days to visit. 

Bánh by Lauren, Chinatown (Manhattan)

After losing her pastry chef job at Gramercy Tavern during the pandemic, Lauren Tran took to Instagram to vend $40 boxes of Vietnamese-American-French pastries, which sold out in hours. Following a successful Kickstarter campaign, Tran and husband Garland Wong opened this slim bakery in Chinatown in mid-June. The specialties are intensely green pandan sweets, including an ultralight chiffon cake, macarons and an eye-catching, chewy, steamed honeycomb cake ($5) known as bánh bò nướng, made from a mix of tapioca and rice four.

The couple joined with Ryan Rhodes of Seattle’s Canlis on a coffee program offering traditional Vietnamese phin-style drinks, such as espresso with sweet-salty cream. To avoid the crowds, drop in on weekdays around 9 a.m. 

Radio Bakery, Greenpoint

On weekends, the line for a Radio Bakery pistachio croissant ($8) or a slice of sausage and chive focaccia snakes down the block, as many as 40 people deep. (Don’t be deterred: The queue moves quickly.) The Brooklyn smash hit comes from Gramercy Tavern alum Kelly Mencin, who launched the baked-goods program at neighborhood favorite Rolo’s. From there, she and a few Rolo’s colleagues (Howard Kalachnikoff, Rafiq Salim, Stephen Maharam and Ben Howell) opened their seasonal, French-inclined bakery that optimizes both laminated dough and a sourdough starter.

Sandwiches, such as the roasted asparagus and feta with spring pea pesto, which start at $13.50, are made with a signature bread that Mencin describes as “stretched ciabatta.” She calls the morning bun—croissant dough smeared with butter, then rolled up with Earl Grey-lemon sugar—a “heavy hitter.” If you’re lucky, pastries will be fresh from the oven: Brown butter corn cakes usually emerge around 9 a.m.; croissants come out around 11:30.

The Bakery at Greywind, Hudson Yards

There’s a hidden, compact marble counter in the back of chef Dan Kluger’s American restaurant Greywind in Hudson Yards. And since last summer it’s served as the venue’s retail bakery arm—a place for customers to grab a chewy sesame ginger cookie ($5), some fancy Cheez-It-inspired crackers or a sourdough croissant to take home. Chef de cuisine Jake Novick-Finder works in tandem with Kluger on the recipes, which include $19 fried chicken katsu sandwiches on milk bread as the daily lunch special on Thursdays. 

Paloma Coffee & Bakery, Greenpoint

Reuben Villagomez opened the first Paloma during the pandemic as a tiny grab-and-go space on Meserole Avenue in Brooklyn’s Greenpoint. Then he brought on former Ole & Steen US corporate chef—and now partner—Alexander Zecena to spearhead an expert laminated-dough program. This winter came a second Paloma in Greenpoint, on Nassau Avenue. It serves as the budding brand’s commissary, pumping out beautifully flaky mango-coconut-passionfruit croissants ($8) and creamy pistachio éclairs. Here, everything is prepared in-house, down to the lox on the croissant breakfast sandwich. For his ambitious coffee program, Villagomez sources single-origin  beans—including the prized, and pricey, geisha varietal—and roasts them himself. Order a light roast pour-over alongside a pistachio pain suisse or the savory Reuben croissant. 

Somedays, Astoria

Chip City Cookies executives Peter Phillips, Dion Vangelatos and Eddie Mamiye have (mostly) traded in dough for viennoiserie at this 800-square-foot corner bakery in Astoria, Queens. Except for the chocolate chunk cookie, all the baked goods are made from laminated dough, created by Chief Culinary Officer Arlander Brown. There are three signature flavors of his attention-getting lattice croissants ($9): pistachio raspberry hazelnut praline and prosciutto Gruyère, as well as playful riffs on the classic shape, such as popular hybrid croissant-pretzel. While the small space is designed for takeaway, Somedays also has some seats out front. 

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