SF: Move Over Cruffin and Cronut; The Chounut Debuts Sunday

You went crazy for cronuts then consumed cruffins like there was no tomorrow. Now, get ready to cheer on the chounut, which makes its debut in San Francisco this weekend at CHOUX Bakery in the.Lower Haight.

CHOUX (pronounced “shoe”) owner Laura Athuil, who hails from Nice, France, opened her one-of-a-kind French cream puff shop last August. This Sunday (March 22), she’ll launch her chounut—a melt in your mouth doughnut with a French twist, a delicate glazed choux bun that’s shaped like a doughnut and filled with delectable French custard.

They’ll be two chounut flavors this Sunday: the Berries & Cream Chounut, filled with raspberry curd and vanilla custard, topped with sugar icing and dried strawberries, along with a delicious Supernuts Chounut, made with hazelnut custard, sugar icing and topped with a sweet and salty almond crunch. CHOUX Bakery’s chounut will be available on weekends only, with new flavors each week.

Athuil’s creation follows in the footsteps of the cronut, a croissant-doughnut pastry invented by Chef Dominique Ansel and trademarked by his New York City bakery, Dominique Ansel Bakery. After its launch on May 10, 2013, cronut pastry fans spanned the world from Berlin to Singapore, making it the most virally talked about dessert item in history.

Then came the cruffin, a croissant-muffin hybrid, which made news nationwide last month when Mr. Holmes Bakehouse in the Tenderloin reported that its cruffin recipe had been stolen from the four-month-old shop, along with five binders containing over 200 recipes from the bakery’s kitchen.

Let’s hope Athuil keeps her recipe under lock and key.