Pacific Nutwest - Part 1

Blognut would like to turn over the keyboard to donut field-correspondant the Beta Blognut, in what is our first ever guest post. Enjoy.

Top Pot Coffee
2124 5th Avenue
Seattle, Washington 98121

While the Beta Blognut swore to not make a trip out to the Pacific Northwest into a working vacation, he has a hard time turning down either friends or palindromes (note: this also includes requests from people named Bob or Anna or Emily Lime) and so he found himself outside the clean and classic lines of Seattle's Top Pot Coffee Shop, scoping out doughnuts for The Blognut (original version). He would've stopped just because of the bucking bronco neon sign that caps the sign, but the spot is renowned for a fine cup and a nice glass case of doughnuts.

Beta Blognut wonders how 'nice' they might actually be though. Sure, Top Pot is spacious, with streams of sunlight coursing through the front windows. Such natural light draws the eye to the sleek and orderly 1920s interior design and the walls of thirty-foot high bookshelves (Beta doesn't have enough time to even crack a book, as there's back issues of OK! Weekly to be read), but the hi-fi is bumping the new Dixie Chicks, and he wonders if the counter help is ready to play nice.

Fairly certain that he will enjoy the creamy icing of the Chai Nut (which the handmade sign even pronounces as 'Yum!'), it's the only certainty of his order. He therefore asks for some help with the remainder of his order, being pointed towards the Pink Feather Boa and Double Trouble Cake Nut.


(No picture available - Beta Blognut may have eaten the Chai Nut before he was able to snap a photo.)

He admits they all look fairly fantastic on plates, their respective glazes catching the sun just so, the grease illuminated in such light. Since the Chai is sure to please, he starts in on it. The yellow cake is a tad greasy, but it feels weightless on the palette, each bite growing more supple as he chews. Delicious as the cake is, it overtakes the delicate chai icing. Isolated, the pink icing betrays not a hint of chai's inherent spiciness. Wait a second? Pink? Beta Blognut fears he may have just been duped as an out-of-towner and given something other than the Chai 'Yum!' Nut, which makes him worry that the counter advice may not have been ready to play nice, intending to dupe this pigeon that takes portraits of his 'nut in public. The doughnut is not shabby, but the weight of expectations is difficult to overcome.


With some trepidation, he bites into the Feather Boa. Fear not, for here, the taste is FABULOUS. Far more robust even though the cake itself is nearly the same as the pink 'nut, and yet the tangle of shaved coconut that crowns the cake makes all the difference. Creamy and coconutty, it offers a crucial counter-texture to the butteryness of the cake nut, a perfect balance struck as each bite moves around in his mouth, the supple bolus mingling with the dried curls of coconut. It encapsulates the confusion that now runs through his mind, sweet yet sharp, the counter help not ready to make nice yet making an excellent suggestion.


Picked over the eye-catching Chocolate Sandcastle (dusted with what looks like beach sand) at the bequest of the doughnut pusher, this is about as much chocolate as Beta Blognut can possibly handle (unless it's that time of the month and he's feeling cranky and unloved). The chocolate cake is slightly drier than the yellow, yet the chocolate icing covers the difference. Each bite mingles, melting not in the hand, but in the mouth. The cake and icing turn into velvet on the tongue, so smooth and rich, a fine chocolate taste experience. How could he have ever doubted the advice of the Doughnut Man?, he wonders now, as he floats off into both chocolate Nirvana and insulin shock simultaneously.

Donut Scores:

Chai: 6.9
Pink Feather Boa: 9.0
Double Trouble Cake: 9.3