(Photo: Hannah Whitaker/New York Magazine)

How do you know you’ve made it in the retail specialty-food world? For Dan Guerrera, the founder of the Downtown Cookie Co., it was when random strangers started shouting, “Hey, it’s the cookie guy!” when he was walking down the street or going out for a jog. It’s fitting for Guerrera to be the symbol of his fledgling company: Until it started taking off, entirely by word of mouth, he was Downtown Cookie Co.’s sole baker, order-taker, and deliveryman. Before this, Guerrera worked as an estate manager, but his occupation grew out of his hobby. He baked cookies with his mother, and his still emulate hers: tall, chewy, resolutely homey, and made from all-natural ingredients. The varieties range from a pillowy ginger to a dense peanut butter, an almond-flecked jam thumbprint, a textbook oatmeal raisin, and a couple terrific versions of chocolate chip. Guerrera is such a stickler for freshness that he declined Saks’ offer to carry his line. “My philosophy is, I want to deliver a fresh cookie,” he says, which means they can’t sit around. Instead, he arranged a trunk show of sorts at the store, offering samples and taking orders. Consider them bespoke cookies: made to order, and available by the $24 dozen at 646-486-3585.

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• Archive: “Food Features”
• Articles by Robin Raisfeld | Rob Patronite
• Table of Contents: Nov 24, 2008 issue of New York | Subscribe!