I am stricken. The sublime Elk Candy Company, late of East 86th street, and then of 2nd Avenue, has folded. Years ago, it was a tiny place where, I fantasized, wizened crones from the Bavarian woods ground almonds, sculpted marzipan pigs and bathed in dark chocolate. The store was virtually empty until Easter and Christmas, when people lined up around the block. Then it disappeared, to reemerge phoenix-like in a larger, wood paneled incarnation on 2nd ave in the low 80s -- still bursting with abstruse German goodies, excellent non pareils,
(or, as my English mother called them, hundreds and thousands), and a dazzling and whimsical array of sublime marzipan.
Does anyone know an even vaguely comparable Manhattan substitute??? For the marzipan, especially.