What's a baker to do when all foodies can talk about, on both sides of the Atlantic, is the cronut craze, a croissant-doughnut that NPR reported on earlier this year? Simple: Come up with an equally addictive hybrid dessert.
Inspired by the increasing appetite for "mash-up" desserts — fusing two calorie- and fat-filled items into one — Britain's Evening Standard newspaper tasked food writer and blogger Victoria Stewart with commissioning a winning dessert combination to rival the cronut.
"We were keen to get something new, as we always try to move the story on a bit," says Stewart.
American baker Bea Vo was tapped because of her background in hybrid desserts. Vo opened the first of her three London bakeries, Bea's of Bloomsbury, in 2008, and she was already beloved by customers for her "duffin," a cake doughnut filled with jam, which she created a few years ago. With a loyal following for her inventive desserts, Vo was given a list of experimental fusion foods to whip up for the Standard.
"One of them was the muffle, a muffin and waffle. We did make one, but the fruit caramelized too quickly," Vo tells The Salt. "The trick to fusion desserts is to bring out the best of both." Which is why Vo's invention — the "townie" — has been a huge success. The brownie-tartlet has a gooey center and a crisp outer shell.
"I immediately saw it and thought, 'Why hasn't anyone done that before?' " Vo tells The Salt. She says the fact that brownie dough isn't very wet prevents the shell from getting soggy, and also allows for under-baking the brownie to give the center that highly sought after gooeyness.
But while Vo knew it would work, she didn't expect to sell more than a few dozen. Instead, she sold 800 townies in 10 days and garnered attention from U.S. TV networks. "This is one of those unusual things that really had its own life," she says.