Time to start your engines, there are croissants in McKinney to check out — at a bakery and gelateria called Cremcrittos Gelato & Pastry, which opened in late 2020 in a newly-built center just west of US-75 and north of SH 121, at 3755 S. Lake Forest Dr.

Cremcritto's is a family project from brothers Mike Yim and Young Yim, and they're putting out gorgeous stuff — including croissants, cronuts, and gelato — with everything made from scratch.

They share a passion for good-quality baked goods and wanted to bring something to DFW of a high caliber.

"We had a plan to open a bakery for two years," Mark says. "The virus pushed us back but we're grateful to finally be open."

The two brothers, both in their 30s, moved with their family from South Korea to Fort Worth when they were in their teens.

Pastry-wise, they have the chops. Young has been a baker for nearly four years, and Mark was previously a pastry cook who studied at The French Pastry School in Chicago.

After graduating, he did an internship at the Wynne Hotel Las Vegas for eight months, then moved back to Dallas, where he worked at the Ritz-Carlton Dallas hotel for a year and a half.

Their menu is well conceived, with cinnamon rolls, apple fritters, Danish, trendy cronuts, and croissants both sweet and with savory fillings such as ham & cheese.

On a typical day, they offer about 16 pastries and 8 flavors of gelato. Their current bestseller is an almond cream cronut with almond butter cream and almond nougatine on top.

Young makes all the pastries in the morning, while Mark makes the gelato for the afternoon, which he makes from scratch, avoiding the "base" pre-made mix that many gelato use.

"I'm against using the base, I hate the base," he says. "I make it with milk, cream, skim milk powder, sugar — I can tell you everything that's in my gelato."

His gelato flavors include staples like chocolate and vanilla, but also toasted vanilla almond and roasted yam.

"We're limiting it to eight flavors for now, but when the weather warms up, we'll offer more flavors, and also sell popsicles," he says.

Their gelato-pastry combo was by design.

"We've combined them so that, in the morning we sell pastries and in the afternoon, we transition to gelato," he says. "That way, we can be open all day and serve the community by selling pastries — that's what we want to do."