BS: Best Doughnuts

Subject: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 09 Jun 10 - 05:21 PM

What supermarket sells the best doughnuts? My nomination (UK) is Morrisons. Nice size, well filled, and good value.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 09 Jun 10 - 05:32 PM

I can't eat them but I have recently heard other places do not have maple bars...is this an urban legend or is it really true...they are so good. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: kendall
Date: 09 Jun 10 - 07:25 PM

Hannaford's has molasses and chocolate donuts. Almost as good as home made.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Rapparee
Date: 09 Jun 10 - 09:59 PM

Fred Meyer carries them, mg -- at least around here.

But the best doughnuts were those my mother made. Unfortunately, she took the recipe with her so I got to be good so I can go heaven when I leave this world so I can have more of her doughnuts.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Amergin
Date: 09 Jun 10 - 10:06 PM

Voodoo Donuts!

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: open mike
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 12:02 AM

http://www.secretdonutrecipe.com/
http://www.secretdonutrecipe.com/page1/page1.html

here is a you tube donut video...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bITguiRnA-c

i am getting hungry!!

we used to have a krispy kreme donut shop near here
but it closed down

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Amergin
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 01:11 AM

Krispy Kremes are very mediocre.....I never could understand their popularity.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 02:39 AM

Always loved Krispy Kreme... think it is the sugar glaze. They are ludicrously expensive in the UK compared to US.

This is a good thing!

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Allan C.
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 06:30 AM

I was a professional donut baker for a few years and baked in a number of bakeries. I can say with some authority that virtually all of the pre-packaged donuts found in groceries are crap. Some groceries that have their own bake shops can produce decent donuts, but the very best, IMHO, come from Mr. Donut shops. For me, the very best donut is a plain, cake donut fresh from the frier - any older than that and I don't want it.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: GUEST,Kendall
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 07:12 AM

Raparie, would you settle for my formula?

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: lefthanded guitar
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 06:48 PM

Krispy Kreme is the best donut, but they definitely taste better down south. I don't know why. Same reason Nathan's hot dogs are best in Coney Island, I guess.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 09:09 PM

I don't think anyone makes real donuts anymore...except for the few people who still make them at home. All the grocery donuts are pathetic, and the same goes for all the donuts sold in fast food outlets.

I remember having REAL donuts way back in the 60s! They were the last real donuts I ever had. My mother made them.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Joe_F
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 09:18 PM

My information may be out of date, but I believe that in New York City the meanest subway-station vendor has access to better raised doughnuts than can be found in any other city. Krispy Creme did a fair imitation, and it was available in Boston for a while, but there seems to be no market for real doughnuts here; for the native barbarians, a doughnut means a toy truck tire, anchor ring, lifesaver, or boiled sphincter with sugar on it.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Rapparee
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 10:05 PM

Kendall, if you make 'em I'll try to gulp them down. If they're not any good I'll gulp them back up.

And let's not forget crullers.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: number 6
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 10:09 PM

Kendall mentioned those molasses doughnuts found at Hannaford's (a supermarket chain in the state of Maine).

They must be the same ones I've seen at Hannaford's ... a brand called Mrs. Dunster's.

Mrs. Dunster's Doughnuts are made in Sussex, New Brunswick. Crazy thing is they don't sell those molasses doughnuts here in New Brunswick.

Mrs. Dunster's

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 10:29 PM

Most are edible, if they don't have jelly fillings.
Cinnamon buns are trumps!

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Bobert
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 11:11 PM

Was 'round 1:30 in the mornin' back in '69 and my band had just finished a gig somewhere in or around Richomnd and that meant...

...Krispy Kreme...

Yeah, it was out Broad Street just past Staples Mill Rd. on the right and seems that all the bands would end up there after their gigs...

I don't know if it was the doughnuts, which I thought were great, or the funkiness of the joint but yeah... Krispy Kreme...

BTW, it's still there...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: open mike
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 11:19 PM

darn it all, anyway!! after reading this thread, then cruising you tube for recipes and how to videos, (some which advocated using refridgerated biscuit dough...yuck) when i got to town today i had a hankering for grease and sugar and went to the donut shop for a maple donut. (embarassing...as it is right across the street from the health food store, where I "should" have been shopping)....yumm for 75 cents i had a taste treat! the shop is called, Helen's Donut Nook, and brings back memories of making donuts with my mother, HELEN! I seem to recall a recipe that uses potatoes in the dough/batter...see:
http://www.cooks.com/rec/search/0,1-0,potato_donut,FF.html
Speaking of round things with holes in the middle -- perhaps bagels
are better for you because they are boiled, (and baked) not fried in grease--
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emeril-lagasse/homemade-bagels-recipe/index.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagel
http://www.dacodoc.net/video.php?video=bagels (in french...)

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: LadyJean
Date: 10 Jun 10 - 11:34 PM

Absolutely, positively the best donuts in the world are the ones you make at home, yourself, fresh out of the deep fryer, and just shaken in a paper bag full of powdered sugar. Of course it makes a horrendous mess. I haven't made donuts in years. Next best, go to Prantl's bakery on Walnut Street in Pittsburgh. Their donuts should not even be spoken of on the same day as Krispy Kreme's

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: mousethief
Date: 11 Jun 10 - 02:06 AM

Raised donuts are only donuts by analogy. Real donuts are made from batter.

There used to be a donut shop in the U District in Seattle back when I was in college ("university" if you're a Brit). It was tucked in a tiny space in between two storefronts, maybe 8 feet wide at most -- the back counter, where the equipment and stuff was, then the bar, then the stools, then the walkway. Maybe 2' wide tops, each.

I would go in there in the mornings and buy two still-warm donuts, and a little carton of milk. The stools were all full of old men in working clothes. I got the donuts in a bag, and ate them on my way to my first class. By the time I ate the first one, the grease from the second one had made the bag transparent where it touched. No powdered sugar, no cinnamon, no glaze, no jelly, no artificial maple frosting. Just donuts as God intended them. (or as Darwin intended them, if you're an atheist)

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Wolfhound person
Date: 11 Jun 10 - 06:27 AM

This thread was started by a UK poster, I think. Any recommendations from this side of the pond?
Greggs used to be good before they went national and mass-produced.....

Best ones I ever had were in Copenhagen, in a park.

Yum

Paws

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Stu
Date: 11 Jun 10 - 06:37 AM

Jammy doughnuts from Brassingtons in Macclesfield.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Penny S.
Date: 11 Jun 10 - 06:50 AM

Real doughnuts are made from bread dough. Hence the word dough. They are subspherical with no hole, hence the element nut. They have jam in the middle and sugar in the outside. Unless they are Geo. Ort's Dunstable doughnuts, which are smaller and sold in bakers' dozens.

I think it is not wise to throw around the word real when discussing food with well accepted variants.

A Krispy Creme outlet opened near me, and I was going to try them, but watching through the window I was not impressed with aspects of their hygiene.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: olddude
Date: 11 Jun 10 - 12:30 PM

tim hortons , tim hortons, tim hortons, tim hortons !!

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: PoppaGator
Date: 11 Jun 10 - 01:25 PM

Beignets, a French variant of the humble donut, are available in the US only in New Orleans, and only from a very few outlets even here; they're unique and don't really bear comparison to "regular" donuts. They MUST be consumed very shortly after they are produced ~ otherwise, they assume the density and texture of hockey pucks. This infinitesimal shelf life dictates that beignets are available only on-the-spot where they are produced.

Krispy Kreme opened a couple of stores here a few years ago. One ~ located in the French Quarter less than a block from beignet vendor Cafe du Monde ~ quickly went out of business, but several suburban KK outlets continue to thrive. I like the KK "original glazed" when purchased immediately off the automated assembly line. Their various other flavors do not seem particularly special to me, and I never buy them when packaged for sale at supermarkets, etc.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: mousethief
Date: 11 Jun 10 - 01:38 PM

Real doughnuts are made from bread dough. Hence the word dough. They are subspherical with no hole, hence the element nut.

Faugh. Yet another victim of the confusion between etymology and meaning.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Jun 10 - 02:03 PM

Beignets with chicory coffee at the Cafe du Monde, watching the folks in Jackson Square or better, watching The River flow by.... Ah, bliss.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: open mike
Date: 11 Jun 10 - 04:03 PM

here's another fried treat (no rising required...batter instead of dough..)funnel cake - often found at fairs and festivals...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48Lv3vgmfRw&feature=fvw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szeQihDGXZ4&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xyplVdOGoI

can you imagine being in a booth in the hot hot summer time
witha vat of frying oil making these??!!


yikes!

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: GUEST,Russ
Date: 11 Jun 10 - 06:56 PM

I'm a Krispy Kreme guy.

I love the Original glazed, hot out of the grease. If you're with a friend or 2 buy 2 dozen. Eat the first dozen while walking to the car.

It is unusual for me to have day old Krispy Kremes. They are a pale reflection of the hot fresh originals. But they still taste better than anything else I can buy in my area.

Russ (Permanent GUEST)

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: GUEST,Sandy (lost cookie)
Date: 12 Jun 10 - 12:06 AM

Tim Horton's glazed sour cream are my pick from doughnut shops but Mrs. Dunster's are my pick at the supermarkets. My wife can beat either with her home fryer but she knows that if she cooks them I will sit down and eat them until all are gone, and that is not a good thing for me!

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: LadyJean
Date: 12 Jun 10 - 12:25 AM

Legend has it that a pilgrim woman was making fried cakes during an Indian raid. As she was pulling one out of the fat, an arrow went through the middle of the cake, and the donut was born. It is, of course, only legend.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: kendall
Date: 12 Jun 10 - 08:10 PM

Actually the donut was invented right here in Camden Maine by a sea captain who didn't like the solid gob of fried dough. He made a hole in it so the fat would reach to the interior and it would be fried all over the thing.

Look, you guys can have all the Krispy Cremes you want, just don't call them donuts. OK?

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: GUEST,Russ
Date: 13 Jun 10 - 05:08 PM

Kendall,

What is the source of your definition of "donut"?

Russ (Permanent GUEST)

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Alan Day
Date: 13 Jun 10 - 06:12 PM

Well it is traditional that if ever I walk on Brighton Palace Pier I have a couple of freshly made American Doughnuts. As for the taste I do not think I can recommend them, but it's TRADITION !!
Al

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: frogprince
Date: 13 Jun 10 - 08:35 PM

"Beignets with chicory coffee at the Cafe du Monde, watching the folks in Jackson Square or better, watching The River flow by.... Ah, bliss."

Believe it; just once so far for me, but maybe again one of these years.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: kendall
Date: 13 Jun 10 - 08:43 PM

Russ, Maine history.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: kendall
Date: 13 Jun 10 - 08:49 PM

Check out wikipedia. The origin of the donut is sorta like Paul Bunyan. Maine lore says he was born in Maine, but Minnesota also claims him. Considering that there was a Maine long before there was a Minnesota, well, go figure.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: bobad
Date: 13 Jun 10 - 08:50 PM

"Beignets with chicory coffee at the Cafe du Monde, watching the folks in Jackson Square or better, watching The River flow by.... Ah, bliss."

I, too have had the pleasure a couple of times and hope to have it again before shuffling off. It's one of those experiences that is so site specific that it can be imitated but never duplicated.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: GUEST,homegroan
Date: 13 Jun 10 - 09:47 PM

It does not matter the batter of the blather of this thread.

What ever the weather...
Or...whether....you call them
Buck Balls
Ginger Nuts
Or ... donuts

Homegrown, and home-fried...
Are the only sort that should keep a folk-forum satisfied.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: GUEST,Russ
Date: 13 Jun 10 - 09:58 PM

Kendall,

Thanks, but since I am not from Maine my knowledge of Maine history is limited.

I've never been to Maine so I have never eaten a donut in that state.

All the definitions of "donut" and "doughnut" I have looked at include no essential characteristics that rule out Krispy Kremes.

Russ (Permanent GUEST)

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: number 6
Date: 13 Jun 10 - 11:03 PM

"I took up all of my winnings, and I gave my little Bessie half
And she tore it up and threw it in my face, just for a laugh
Now there's one thing in the whole wide world, I sure do like to see
That's how that little sweet thing of mine, dips her doughnut in my tea"
.......excerpt from "Up on Cripple Creek" by Robbie Robertson

Back in my senior year in high school my friend Greg and I knew this older woman (all of the age of 25) who ...... oh never mind

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 14 Jun 10 - 01:18 AM

Well you guys were just a bit late for Doughnut Day. See also Wikipedia on Natinoal Doughnut Day, wherein the item is defined as "an edible, torus-shaped piece of dough which is deep-fried and sweetened", FWIW.

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Alice
Date: 14 Jun 10 - 01:47 AM

Beignets with chicory coffee at the Cafe du Monde

...yes, something that everyone should experience at least once!
Let the good times roll.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Alice
Date: 14 Jun 10 - 01:51 AM

I experienced this in 1986. Memories....
Cafe du Monde, New Orleans, beignet, French Quarter

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: kendall
Date: 14 Jun 10 - 06:38 AM

Russ, everything evolves including the original donut. Those great gobs of sugary stuff are examples. Hell, even Rock and roll is now called music by some!

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 14 Jun 10 - 07:03 PM

A Krispy Kreme opened near here about a year ago to great fanfare. It went out of business a couple of weeks ago. Couldn't compete with Dunkin' Donuts. Nothing touches home made doughnuts, although there's a restaurant near here that makes them fresh, every day... just lightly dipped in sugar. They're all weird shaped, just like home made. I could eat 100.

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Ed T
Date: 14 Jun 10 - 08:52 PM

The wide world of doughnuts, from thinkquest:

http://library.thinkquest.org/J003336/

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 13 Jul 24 - 06:35 AM

I'm refreshing this thread as I was wondering about how doughnut shaped came to be a description of a toroid. I presume that this was an invention from the USA.
I never saw a toroidal doughnut in the UK until the mid 1960s, they were always a spherical shape with sugar coating and jam injected into the middle of the ball.
When I was just at starting school age I remember crossing the road with my father to the bakery where he needed to discuss something with the baker, my godfather. We went into the works at the back, once upon a time an ironfoundry, and there was the machine that mixed the dough and produced the balls of dough which came out down a sort of helter-skelter spiral on the outside ready to be deep fried. I was given one to eat, almost too hot to hold. A memmory for life!

Robin

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 13 Jul 24 - 02:21 PM

As a Limey whose experience of doughnuts is pretty limited (mostly, but not limited to, Morrisons, and fresh ones bought from doughnut stands at Lincoln Christmas Markets over several years), the best I’ve ever tasted were Tim Horton’s Boston Doughnuts during our trips to Canada (ON, AB, BC).

IMHO, but YMMV and I’m cool with that…

Subject: RE: BS: Best Doughnuts
From: robomatic
Date: 13 Jul 24 - 03:12 PM

With great affection I recall several children's books called "Homer Price" stories. In one of them Homer agrees to watch a donut shop but does something to the automatic donut machine to turn it on, and then he can't or doesen't know how to turn it off, sort of a 'sorcerer's apprentice' situation. He is stacking donuts all over the shop.

In another story he learns a rhyming reframe that can't be stoppeuntil he teaches it to someone else.

There may be fractured neurons involved. Mine. Biden my time I guess.

I also recall with great affection hanging out at Dunkin' Donuts, which was an east coast and also interstate highway chain which in my memory sold good donuts and coffee. I even have one of their original coffee cups which weighs damn near a pound and is suitable for home defense. I haven't been in one for many years as I do not need medical professionals to tell me those things are way off limits to me now.