Who Needs Cronuts When You Have Afghan Bread?

Last month we told you about the trendy cronut, the half-croissant, half-doughnut product that Royal Cafe of Wayne started selling.

Things have soured since then, after the maker of the cronut, the Swiss Haus in Philadelphia, found out that the Royal Cafe was charging twice what owner Torpekay Habashzada paid for them at the bakery.

"Outraged that his hand-crafted 'Swiss Cro-Cremes' were being marked-up, Swiss Haus owner Jim Hausman" contacted writer Simon Van Zuylen-Wood to announce he would stop selling to the Royal Cafe immediately, it was reported.

Radnor Patch spoke with Habashzada on Monday about the cronut controversy, and she said the partnership just didn't work out.

Firstly, she said, she needed to make a profit on the sweet treat, which she would pick up in Philadelphia each week. Secondly, she said, Swiss Haus wanted her to sell the cronuts within six hours of receiving them. They suggest customers "eat the product within 6 hours of its making for maximum freshness and flavor," the owner said.

It didn't make sense to her to have to "eat" the cost of dozens of cronuts, so as quickly as the trend came into Wayne it has disappeared.

But, Habashzada told me, she now has something else that no one around has and that's traditional Afghan bread, which Royal Cafe is using to make sandwiches.

She gets a daily shipment from another state (which she would not disclose) of the bread, which is a staple in Afghanistan, Habashzada's native country.

They also serve the flatbread with soups at the cafe. "There's nothing like it," she said. "Everyone eats it and they love it. It's always on the table [in Afghanistan]. In the morning, at lunch and dinner."