New York has a bad habit of inflicting trend culture upon the masses — especially when it comes to food. You can almost immediately identify a year based on the cult confection of its time. Magnolia Bakery cupcakes (created in 1996, but shot to fame in 2000 after being featured on an episode of “Sex and the City”), cronuts (2013), Levain’s gargantuan chocolate chip cookies (1995) and, more recently, dot cakes (just why?). While all of these goodies are still around, their public-derived hype cycles have since fizzled out. You don’t have to be a pastry chef, however, to comprehend that dessert shouldn’t be used as an edible marketing concept.
Whether you’re a keen home baker, a devout cake connoisseur, or simply just aiming to reject what dessert slop the algorithm throws your way, sweet treats should deliver more than a mere quick hit. Maybe Marcel Proust was indeed onto something!
The best examples of this seep with tradition, skill and look too good to eat. To many, no other dessert exemplifies indulgence, legacy, craft — and maybe even a friendly dose of snobbery — quite like Sant Ambroeus’ principessa cake. Whether you’re dining in or merely passing by any of the Milanese cafe’s 10 locations, you’ve likely seen her: fabulously fluffy sponge cut with butter-yellow, lemon-scented cream, then a towering cloud of whip all encased in a dainty pink marzipan topcoat. And miraculously, all those intricately crafted layers result in a perfect bite that isn’t too sweet. She’s an old-school Hollywood diva personified in confectionary form.
Since the 1930s, when Sant Ambroeus was a thriving Milanese establishment and decades before its formal infiltration into New York’s dining scene in the ’80s, the princess cake has become the restaurant’s premiere dessert offering. Up to 400 slices are served a day, globally, and its never-waning popularity has helped secure its status as one of the more universally adored treats by the ever-fickle fashion set. While the traditional Swedish version, called a prinsesstårta, typically features a layer of raspberry jam and a bright green marzipan coating, Sant Ambroeus’ iteration is respectfully remixed for a more metropolitan crowd. Over the decades, the principessa cake in particular has cultivated a devout — and fashionable — following. Doting power publicists often send out a full cake to clients. Fashion influencers will film themselves mid-bite to spread the social media gospel of the girlish treat. Magazine editors-in-chief (those who still exist, anyway) will whip out the corporate card to purchase a principessa for their favorite exiting employee’s almost-always-awkward office farewell parties or to toast to 180 years of business, like Town & Country recently did. (For context, the cake’s standard 14-inch size version starts at $200 and its largest 18-inch iteration can run one back $360 — plus tax.) Actor and eternal millennial icon Lindsay Lohan even indulged in the dessert for her recent 40th birthday, with the pastry making an appearance in her celebratory Instagram photo dump.
“Listen, cakes are for all ages. God knows, people are getting cake all of the time. But I do think there’s just that little bit of elevation that goes along with getting a really adult, chic, sophisticated cake from Sant Ambroeus,” said Daise Bedolla, an editor at Into the Gloss, writer of the beauty newsletter I Just Want to Talkand a longtime fan of the princess cake. “I’ve been in New York City for almost 13 years now, and one of the first times that I went to Sant Ambroeus I was on a student budget,” she recalled. She and a friend would split the cost of a slice. “I would pay seven, and she would pay seven, and we would buy a slice and go eat it on a bench, and we felt so fancy,” Bedolla said. “I feel like I’m in Sofia Coppola’s ‘Marie Antoinette’ whenever I’m eating a piece.”
Sant Ambroeus’ rendition of the cake has even inspired an offshoot of product offerings in the beauty and wellness space. Flamingo Estate, the luxury, LA-based lifestyle company (and a favorite of the fashion set) released a string of products inspired by the restaurant’s signature slice just last year, including a powdery, almond-forward scented soap bar, a coordinating candle and a fragrance oil.
For Aaron Harvey, Flamingo Estate’s head of creative, Sant Ambroeus’ twist on the princess cake represents a type of unwavering commitment to sophisticated simplicity — something that has seemingly become an endangered art form within the food industry.
“One year we spent the holidays in New York at the Carlyle, and a piece of Princess Cake at Sant Ambroeus, followed by a walk in the park became a kind of daily ritual,” Harvey said in an email. “Every single time it was perfect. We fell in love. It’s easy to do something well once or twice, but that kind of consistent, unwavering daily delight is incredibly rare,” he continued. “There’s a timelessness to the Princess Cake. It’s beautiful but not overly decorative, sweet but not cloying. It’s the antithesis of the Dubai Chocolate Fun-fetti Unicorn things everyone seems to be talking about. It’s delicious and uncomplicated, and there is nothing more elegant than that.”
So why has this dessert garnered such a loyal clientele? If you ask Sant Ambroeus’ Culinary Director Iacopo Falai, the answer is simple: It’s all in the presentation and that crucial first bite.
“It’s a combination between the color and the flavor and simply that it’s adorable,” said Falai. “Also the fact that you can take a fork and easily slice through — it’s not complicated to eat. The texture from the whipped cream and the pastry cream makes it so yummy and a guest’s first bite is extremely important for me.”
Taste aside, there’s something regal about the preservation of tradition. The recipe continues to be the creative constant for a cake that still delights guests 90 years on. Every baker that comes through the establishment’s kitchen doors undergoes a thorough training process to ensure a consistent and near-flawless bake each time.
“It’s fascinating to do the same thing every day and do it well,” Falai said of the restaurant’s longstanding commitment to the cake. “It’s actually very exciting when somebody can conquer a skill and achieve that standard. It’s incredible and, in a way, its own art form.”
And with 90 years of cake-making comes an earned reputation, one that Bedolla believes the dessert has managed to uphold within our ever-changing culinary culture.
“You can take a photo of it and instantly people know where you are. There’s the cool factor and that bit of if-you-know-you-know there,” she said. “It hits all of the right things—it looks beautiful. It’s delicious. And you know what? At the end of the day, a lot of simple things are usually the best ones.”
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