Dominique Ansel Crowned World's Best Pastry Chef of 2017

Today the winners of Best Restaurant and Best Pastry Chef of 2017 have been revealed, and it is Dominique Abdel who is crowned Best Pastry Chef of the year. Luckily this happened when I was in New York. I headed to his establishment for more of his amazing creations. I've been here three times already and wanted to enjoy some of the innovative bites of his that have taken the world by storm... His cookie shots, his superb Cronuts and the marshmallow flamed stick among others.

Dominique Ansel's came to fame when he created the Cronut, a unique creation bringing together the flakiness of a croissant and the richness of a donut. This innovation took the world by storm pushing the French chef to innovate even more. The cookie shot followed, with more exquisite pastries and beautiful masterpieces until he became the world's best.

Is he the world's best or is this one more American marketing strategy to make it seem the Americans are one step ahead of the world? I'm sure he is innovative and that he creates some of the world's best ideas... but when it comes to flavor, I have certainly had better. There's some finesse missing.

The different desserts I tried:

• I had the cookie shot. It's an oily cookie glazed with chocolate and filled with milk. An excellent marketing item but there is nothing exceptional about it. 
• The double chocolate cookie is a good cookie but again certainly not the best I've ever had. Levain remains the best of the best. This one on the other hand is dry, lacks moisture, lacks melted chocolate chips and that extra mile to achieve uniqueness.
• The mango champagne tart also looks great. Mango sheets, rose loukoum chunks and champagne pastry cream on a bed of moist and lightly crunchy dough. An innovation indeed, an interesting flavor but again not the best of the best.
• The salted caramel eclair is indeed different from any other salted caramel eclair I've had. The cream is intensely caramalized, salt caresses your lips, butter slides around your palate and the dough is soft. A heavy yet interesting eclair.
• The "mini me" is a dark chocolate cake with mousse, cake and meringue - a superb chocolate cake, the work of a master. I loved the different layers, which add taste and texture to the mix. Balanced, intense, not crudely sweet and well executed.
• The blossoming hot chocolate is also one of Dominique's unique innovations. Hot chocolate with a blossom flower of marshmallow that opens when in contact with the hot chocolate. Not the best hot chocolate I've had that's for sure, but the idea is unique.

Indeed, I'm a fan of his creations and I like his cakes. Dominique Ansel is surely a mastermind pastry chef but not the world's best when it comes to tasty desserts.