Is New Orleans Finally Ready to Embrace Kolaches? | Eater New Orleans

"Opened on Magazine Street in 2013 and grown into a brand with five New Orleans-area locations and one in Las Vegas, this shop's owner Chris Audler says he added kolaches partly out of opportunity: "I always found it odd that New Orleans, being so close to Houston, really didn’t have a lot of kolache options," Audler says. "I was like, 'No one else is doing it really, so we have to do that.'" The breakfast kolaches began as two savory styles and one fruit-filled style (satsuma curd), though "Believe it or not, the fruit didn’t sell," he notes: "People really wanted the meat one with smoked sausage." Audler preserves family ties to the dish—his great-grandmother baked fruit and meat kolaches in Port Lavaca, Texas, and her Czech maiden name, Pekar, translates to "baker"—but developed his own recipe: an enriched, slightly sweet yeast dough ("and a dash of vanilla"); after proofing he rolls the dough into balls, forming 2-ounce discs, then wraps the dough around smoked sausage, white cheddar, and candied jalapeños for his longest-running kolache, and repeats the process with bacon, American cheese, and scrambled egg for another variation. Once proofed they are brushed with egg wash and baked. During Lent the shop offers kolaches with smoked salmon and cream cheese (flavored with capers and Tabasco green jalapeño pepper sauce), sprinkled with everything bagel seasoning. Across locations the team makes between "three to six dozen of each kolache type daily," and Audler says plainly, "We kill on kolaches." "We can't make enough." - Megan Ulu-Lani Boyanton