Larry King is the food critic we need

Larry King: [sampling rainbow birthday cake] I don’t know what to call this, this is the-

Christina Tosi: So, this is-

Larry King: This looks like a rainbow.

Christina Tosi: This is one of our very popular items as is the slice of pie over here, so I brought these for you to try, but I also want to get your take on them.

Larry King: Oh delicious.

Christina Tosi: What does it taste like, where are you going, did you get a little texture?

Larry King: Very smooth, a lot of flavors, lot of texture. And what are these little things I’m chewing?

Christina Tosi: So those little textures, this is our birthday cake, it’s sort of like an homage to the grocery store cake that you can just pick up and bring to a party, but we make it from scratch-

Larry King: But what are the little bumps-

Christina Tosi: Those are little crumby, sandy versions of the cake itself, but those are my crisp cookie homage-

Larry King: Ah see that’s crisp.

Christina Tosi: So that tells me you would be very into that.

Larry King: I love this cake. You could buy the whole cake at the Milk Bar?

Christina Tosi: You buy the whole cake. We also sell them by the little nugget. [Points to plate of cake truffles] This is called a “birthday truffle,” so instead of selling the cake by the slice, we make these little grab-and-go bites that are a denser version of the cake itself. And then the crumbs that you like, we grind them down and they have a thinner but sandy version on the exterior as a coating.

Larry King: [holding up a truffle] This is very good.

Christina Tosi: Thank you.

Larry King: Very sweet.

Christina Tosi: It is sweet. Most of what we do at Milk Bar is sweet. We also have this fun pie which is-

Larry King: Don’t tell me.

Christina Tosi: [grabs a truffle] What am I doing? So I also brought you-

Larry King: Milk Bar is gonna be a big hit in LA.

Christina Tosi: I hope so.

Larry King: [looks at pie] Now this is a pie.

Christina Tosi: This is a pie.

Larry King: But I have no idea what it is.

Christina Tosi: That’s right.

Larry King: There’s a little sugary thing on top. [he takes a bite of pie]

Christina Tosi: Even if you can’t pick it apart, if you had to give it a name-

Larry King: I tell you unusually, I would eat this a lot.

Christina Tosi: [laughs]

Larry King: Feels familiar, but feels brand-new. It feels I’ve known this, but I have no idea what it is. What is it?

Christina Tosi: [laughs] I love you for saying that. This is a little something that we call “crack pie.” Because it’s-

Larry King: It’s hot! Oh I’m gonna get-

Christina Tosi: You just want to keep going back and eating more-

Larry King: What is it?

Christina Tosi: And it cracks you up when you get on your little sugar high. It’s crack pie-

Larry King: I know, but what does that-

Christina Tosi: It’s inspired by a classic St. Louis gooey butter cake, mixed with a classic Southern pie called “chess pie,” which is what they make down South when they don’t have enough rhubarb to make rhubarb pie-

Larry King: But what is the fruit?

Christina Tosi: There’s no fruit. That’s the thing, but because part of its inspiration comes from the pie you make down South-

Larry King: So what is that yellow thing in the middle-

Christina Tosi: It’s a gooey, buttery filling. Its eggs, which I know you’re not a fan of, milk powder, vanilla, sugar-

Larry King: But it tastes like some sort-

Christina Tosi: Light brown sugar. It tastes like almost pecan pie without the pecans, or like a cherry pie without the cherries. This is what we do at Milk Bar.

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