Above All Else, Monkey Bread

At Loaf, a new bakery and cafe, an assortment of breads — ciabatta, dill, whole wheat, raisin, foccacia and rye — line a high wooden shelf, their crusty good looks set off by a vibrant backdrop of buttercup-yellow paint. But the golden-brown monkey bread ($7), a pull-apart bread baked in a cake pan, and still warm from the oven, handily upstaged the others.

“My son is addicted to it,” said Caryn Stabinsky, the baker. “When we were getting ready to open, I wasn’t baking it, and he’d say, ‘Where’s my monkey bread?’ ” Made with a touch of brown sugar and fragrant with yeast, the puzzlelike bread — fun to say and fun to eat — will undoubtedly stir the same emotions in other neighborhood children.

Ms. Stabinsky, who owns Loaf with her husband, Geoffrey Fischer (the two met while working at WD-50, in Manhattan), favors an old-fashioned American repertoire of cakes and cookies, which includes a dreamy coconut cake ($5.25 a slice); assorted husky cookies ($2.75 each); classic brownies ($3 each); and a charming square confection called pretzel-covered chocolate ($4.25), a fudgy brownie bristling with pretzel pieces — a sort of inside-out chocolate-covered pretzel.

On the savory side, Loaf offers soups, sandwiches and salads, plus galettes and tortas. Customers have already indicated a couple of favorites, among them a lovely grilled tuna, asparagus and avocado salad ($9) with two dressings — one a spicy mayonnaise, the other a bright lemon vinaigrette — and a torta made with spinach, goat cheese and shallot confit ($4 per slice).

Also bound to prove popular as the days warm up are ginger iced tea, made with fresh ginger syrup, and watermelon lemonade, made on the premises from fresh fruit. (Both are $2.75 for 16 ounces.)

Loaf Bakery and Cafe, 387 Main Street, Armonk; (914) 273-4320 or loaf-cafe.com. Open Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.; Saturday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

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Originally Posted By Alice Gabriel