KANSAS CITY, MO — People know what they expect from a baked good: satisfying texture, thrilling flavors and just the right balance of sweet or savory. They want all this — in addition to the unexpected — when they drop by Dominique Ansel Bakery, the 15-year-old eponymous storefront of the James Beard Award-winning French pastry chef.
In the baking space, Dominique is best known for inventing the Cronut in 2013, and he consistently brings unique flavor and texture experiences to his SoHo storefront. Where else can someone purchase made-to-order mini madeleines, perfectly honeycombed croissants and a frozen s’more torched tableside all in one stop?
“I always tell our team that our pastries are almost like silent movie stars,” Dominique said. “They don’t have a voice, but they speak in a way that is easy to understand. After all, you eat with your eyes first, so while a pastry does have to look beautiful upon first glance, it also has to tell a story and be simple to understand, and of course, taste delicious.”
Signature creations
It’s hard to narrow the scope of the bakery’s innovations. The Dominque Ansel lineup is vast, carrying everything from macarons and Dominique’s Kouign-Amann (also known as the DKA) to tarts and pavlova. The chef shared that to keep things fresh, he rotates the menu every six to eight weeks, integrating holiday-inspired offerings with standard fare while crafting specialty products with in-season ingredients.
This cadence excludes the Cronut; the bakery’s staple debuts a new flavor each month. In fact, the flavors intrigue some customers so much that they return frequently — part of what’s dubbed the Cronut Club — just to taste what’s next from Dominique Ansel.
“It’s important for us to keep evolving,” Dominique said. “When the Cronut came out, and there were hundreds of people in line every day, a lot of people told me I should just replicate dozens of Cronut shops everywhere, and it’d be the easy way out. That has never been our intention. We decided early on to change the flavor every month, never repeating, in each of our shops. We’ve created hundreds and hundreds of flavors around the world.”
Innovation here isn’t spurred by the latest sensation gaining traction on social media. Rather, Dominique Ansel Bakery prioritizes its original ideas when it comes to bringing new products to customers from all walks of life.
It’s about connection
“First and foremost, it’s about creating something unique and something that connects with people,” Dominique said. “We don’t look at what trends are out there and then try to follow them. For us, it’s about our own original ideas, not striving to make something ‘go viral.’”
Dominique’s commitment to creating unique products shows in the detail that goes into making each baked good. The Cronut, for instance, requires a three-day production process, with hundreds being glazed and filled by hand before the storefront opens.
While plenty of customers take their baked goods to go in vibrant yellow boxes, many also sit down in the shop’s covered patio to indulge in an artfully layered croissant or sip and crunch on a Cookie Shot. In such a grab-and-go culture, this bakery entices people to pause for a multi-sensory food experience.
“Dessert is such a nostalgic and personal thing for many people,” Dominique concluded. “It brings people back to a moment in time. When we see our guests take a bite of one of our pastries and smile, that makes it all worth it.”
This bakery was featured in the March 2026 Craft to Crumb special edition mini-mag. Read the full Roadshow in the digital issue here.
