Monteleone Bakery Under New Management

Carroll Garden's classic pastry shop Monteleone Bakery, which has roots in the neighborhood going back to 1902, has been through a lot of turmoil in recent years, undergoing a renovation, briefly joined forces with the Cammerari Bakery, and being put on the block.

Now the venerable old store—which many in the area agree has fallen off its game lately—is under new management. The new owners are a husband and wife team with long experience in the pastry biz. They hail from Bensonhurst, another Brooklyn neighborhood known for its Italian-American population and find bakeries.

Days of Bread and Pastry Update

Strolled past Monte Leone's pastry shop (or, as they say, "shoppe") and discovered a few new wrinkles in the second coming of Cammerari's bakery. Seems the bakery was never actually, totally closed. Just closed in Carroll Gardens. There was still a branch in Bensonhurst—where Italian culture also thrives—churning out loaves for restaurants around the town. Also, an article in the window said Monte Leone's had been having cash flow problems and clashed with a health inspector. What? Didn't I buy enough mini eclairs and pignoli cookies to keep them in black?

So, contrary to my previous report, Cammerari's story wasn't as sad as all that, and Monte Leone wasn't exactly enjoying good times. I didn't say this blog was 100 percent fact-based. Just a smattering of fact, with a whole mess of opinion mixed in.

In that same article, one old-timer, excited about Cammerari coming back, said of its wares: "The bread was so crunchy!" Funny. "Crunchy" was just the word I kept coming up with when I conjured up memories about their bread. I didn't think the word was descriptive enough, but I guess it's dead on.

Moonstruck Strikes Again

In the Carroll Gardens neighborhood of Brooklyn, the Monte Leone pastry shop on Court Street recently closed its doors and posted a sign in the window. Amazingly, it wasn't bad news. The sign said the shop would open again soon in collaboration with—wait for it—Cammareri Bakery.

Recognize the name? You should. The bakery, which once sat at the corner of nearby Henry Street and Sackett Street, was featured in the film "Moonstuck." Nicholas Cage's character, Ronny Cammerari, worked there. In fact, the filmmakers changed the name of Cage's character when they decided to use the bakery as a location. The store lived on reflected glory for a few years, with pictures of Cher up on the wall. But it closed in the late '90s in one of the saddest stories I've ever heard. The Cammerari who ran it lost his wife and was so dejected that he couldn't go on, so he gave up the shop and retired.

Since then, the location has been The Red Rail, which had a brief heyday as a Yuppie brunch hangout; then the Red Rail bar, which had no heyday whatsoever. Now, its the Carroll Gardens outpost of the overpriced Park Slope cafe Naidre's. Cammerari's was better than any of them. Another negative aspect of Cammerari's closing: Mazzola's, the bakery down the block, suddenly had no competition, so it started steadily jacking up prices.

So, to see that sign in the window of Monte Leone was like seeing a ghost. How could Cammerari be back? Did the sad old owner find a new wife? Did someone buy the rights to the name? And why does Monte Leone's, which has always done well, need a business partner? Stay tuned.

One odd side note: Monte Leone's used to be located on Columbia near Sackett, just a block from where Cammerari's once sat. They just can't stay apart.