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Zabar’s is keeping the crumbling MetroCard alive.
Thousands of sugar-cookie-loving straphangers are swarming the iconic Upper West Side grocery store to get their hands on an edible version of the beloved piece of transit plastic as it marches toward its final day.
Zabar’s is struggling to keep up with demand for its vanilla MetroCard cookie as the Big Apple grows more and more sentimental for the soon-to-be-gone New York City turnstile icon.
“Why not get it for nostalgia’s sake?” said Kurt Adams, 36, who whisked a cookie off the counter while ordering his morning coffee Tuesday.
The Washington Heights resident said he already pocketed a real MetroCard over the summer in anticipation of its demise — well before the MTA wheeled away its once-omnipresent vending machines.
“I have it at my lockbox at home,” Adams said, adding that the fate of his edible MetroCard is uncertain: “Maybe I’ll save it in the freezer.”
The MetroCard cookies have been flying off the shelves since Oct. 24 when the 90-year-old grocer was announced as one of several MTA partners to honor its dying plastic card with delectable treats.
Carvel cakes and Gong cha tea also were brought in on the plan.
But none seem to have the same stronghold as the simple Zabar’s cookies topped with white icing and the printed MetroCard logo in icing on top of that.
Zabar’s sells as many as 1,000 triangular, MTA-themed cookies a week, roughly 80% of which are a screen print of the famous blue and yellow card.
The grocer also hawks handfuls of Cardvaark — which was once dreamed up to be the ’90s-era mascot for the then-new MetroCard before being killed — but its sales pale in comparison to the ultra-famous piece of plastic.
“Customers come in with huge smiles on their face and go, ‘You got MetroCard cookies?’ ” Scott Goldshine, Zabar’s general manager, told The Post.
“They walk out with five, and they’re pretty happy. And they actually taste pretty good. It looks exactly like a MetroCard.”
Upon their release, the $3.98 cookies were selling out within a matter of hours daily, forcing Goldshine to stagger restocks throughout the day.
The grocery boss expects the demand to only surge as Dec. 31 — the day the last MetroCards will be sold — draws closer and has already put in a bulk order in anticipation of the crush.
“I learned the hard way in the beginning because I couldn’t keep them in stock. But I’ve gotten smarter as I’ve gotten older, so now I make sure they don’t run out,” he said.
“I already told the bakery: Do not tell me ‘no’ when I tell you, ‘I need a couple hundred.’ “
Some customers have expressed their interest in the cookies for nostalgia, with some calling the sugary goodies a “collector’s item.”
Jodi Shapiro, a curator at the New York Transit Museum, told The Post her colleagues have been trying to get their hands on the Zabar’s cookies for weeks — but they’ve been constantly sold out.
The good news is that the cookies are so popular that Goldshine is considering making them a permanent staple at the Broadway shop.
“At this rate, they keep selling. I keep order, they keep selling,” he said.
English (US)