In many places, you can buy a large cookie with half chocolate icing, half vanilla on top. This cookie goes by two names, at least here in New York. Downstate, it is called the black and white cookie. The base is white. Upstate, and notably at Hemstrought’s in Utica, it is called the half moon cookie and the base is chocolate.
I acknowledge the merits of both versions of this treat. I appreciate both, but prefer the proper half moon. I do not appreciate when someone (looking at you, the late P&C Markets) tries to pass off a black-and-white as a half moon.
Here in Albany, we live at the intersection of these two traditions. That’s why the bottom shelf of the case at Bella Napoli in Latham amused me last week when I noticed it.
Yes, a sheet of each type of cookie, coexisting in harmony, but with a respectful distance between them.
I bought a half moon. It was much too cake-like and crumbly, but I enjoyed it anyway.
