Skyscraper Day: Celebrate Concrete and Cronuts

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September 3rd is Skyscraper Day! To celebrate, we're honoring the city that invented skyscrapers and its favorite dessert. From the Empire State Building to One World Trade, New York has been a vertical trendsetter for over a century. And a dessert trendsetter as well. We’re pairing those towering concrete structures with an equally iconic treat that stacks the pastry game sky-high: the cronut.

Skyscraper Trivia to Impress Your Friends

• New York was the birthplace of the modern skyscraper, with the city’s first steel-framed high-rise, the Home Insurance Building, going up in 1885.
• The Empire State Building was built in 410 days—faster than most kitchen renovations.
• The Chrysler Building’s spire was secretly assembled inside the building and hoisted into place overnight in 1929, stealing the title of tallest building.
• One World Trade Center stands a symbolic 1,776 feet tall to commemorate America’s independence.
• The MetLife Building has its own ZIP code (10166) because, well, it’s a skyscraper flex.
• New York is home to over 300 skyscrapers and counting, making its skyline one of the most photographed in the world.

Meet the Cronut: NYC’s Favorite Dessert Export

In 2013, pastry chef Dominique Ansel invented the cronut—a buttery, flaky croissant-doughnut hybrid—and New Yorkers collectively lost their cool. People lined up at 4 a.m. outside Ansel’s Soho bakery, and the dessert became an instant global sensation. Scalpers resold cronuts for $100 a pop. Celebrities sent assistants to wait in line. News outlets went wild.

Like a skyscraper, the cronut is a marvel of engineering: flaky layers, deep-fried perfection, and a glossy glaze that catches the light like a glass tower at sunset...

DIY Cronut Tower: Stack your homemade cronuts into a dessert skyscraper. Points for dramatic presentation.

This Skyscraper Day, honor the ingenuity that made NYC the city of heights by building your own pastry masterpiece. Because if there’s one thing New Yorkers know, it’s that life tastes better with layers.

Cronuts for Lazy Bakers

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Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Equipment

• Large Frying Pan
• Deep Fry Thermometer (Or meat/baking thermometer)
• Cup/Glass/Biscuit Cutter/Cookie Cutter Something to cut cronut circles out of dough, about 3" in diameter
• Metal pastry tip (back circular end) To cut cronut holes out of cronut circles, about 1" in diameter

Ingredients

  

• 2 Packages Pillsbury Original Crescent Dough Sheets Found near other pop-open cans for biscuits and croissants. Puff-pastry dough could also be used.
• 2 Cups Powdered Sugar
• 1 teaspoon Pure Vanilla Extract
• 1 Tablespoon Milk
• Avocado or Vegetable Oil for frying (oil with high smoke point)
• Filling (Optional) Vanilla Pudding, Nutella, Biscoff, Jam
• Other Topping Options If you want other toppings besides glaze, try slathering them with nutella and topping with sprinkles, or covering them with cinnamon sugar. Mmmmm... The sky's the limit!

Instructions

 

Cronut

• Fill large frying pan with about 2 inches of oil. Heat oil to 350º F over medium heat. Use a deep fry thermometer (even a meat thermometer can work) to check temperature. Try to maintain 350º. If necessary adjust burner temperature or remove pan from burner occasionally.
• Carefully remove dough from pop-open can. Fold the dough in half lengthwise, then fold it in half again widthwise. Cut out circles from dough using glass/cutter of choice. You want them about 3".
• Cut out smaller circles from the center of your 3" circles. These are your cronut holes and they should be about 1". (The round end of a pastry tip works well.)
• After you have cut out as many 3" circles as you can, gather up all the scraps and smoosh them together. Roll them out and cut an additional cronut. Any additional scraps you can roll and cut into cronut holes.
• Fry the cronuts for about 90 seconds on each side until golden brown. (Frying only a few at a time helps prevent a drop in the oil temperature.)

  Carefully remove from the oil and place on a plate covered with paper towels. Allow cronuts to cool before glazing.

Glaze

• Mix powdered sugar (1-2 cups depending on desired sweetness and consistency), vanilla extract (1 tsp), and milk (1 TBSP). Add additional milk or powdered sugar as needed.
• If adding an optional filling, cut a cooled cronut in half (like cutting a biscuit or a bun), fill with 2 TBSPs of your filling of choice.
• Drizzle top with glaze and allow to set.
• If you opt to cover with cinnamon sugar, this is the world's best cinnamon.

Keyword croissant, cronut, dessert, donut, fried food, skyscraper day