Giant Tim Horton's Coffee Cup Sighting

Outside Penn Station; 9:30AM.

Taste-off: Dunkin' vs. Tim

A quick break from Portland coverage to weigh in on the Tim Horton’s situation. Like I mentioned the other day, the Canadian doughnut giant has hit New York, replacing 12 mostly shoddy Dunkin’ locations. Time Out New York had something to say. And Gothamist. Even the Times.

I've covered Tim Horton’s in the past: once in Toronto, and once in Massachusetts where this plate found its way into Mrs. B’s purse. The fact that a massive corporate doughnut chain uses porcelain dinnerware is undeniably awesome, but Tim’s doughnuts have me torn. I spent my early years in Buffalo, which is really just an extension of Canada and definitely prime Tim territory. So I really want to like their doughnuts. But I've mostly been disappointed and find they lag well behind Dunkin', Winchell's and Krispy Kreme in the pop-doughnut hierarchy. And definitely behind Shipley's. Plus, doughnut-folk and Canadians were outraged a few years back when they started flash-freezing and shipping doughnuts from a 230,000 square-foot factory in Brantford, Ontario (birthplace of Wayne Gretzky).

But in the interest of being fair, this weekend I conducted a clean slate Dunkin’/Tim comparison, opting for head-to-head plain glazed. My Tim doughnut came from their 42nd Street location. I think it's also a KFC. Or possibly a Taco Bell. Or both like in the song. The competition came from my neighborhood DD, which is also a Baskin Robbins.

Dunkin' Glazed

Visually they were similar and for some reason both photos turned out all Fire In the Sky. The Dunkin' had a slightly darker complexion, but each were pale brown and coated with a thin layer of see-through glaze. The dough was soft and simple with a bit of sweetness, a hint of cinnamon and a bright and yeasty Wonder Breadiness. It was light, refreshing and if a doughnut can be considered summery, this was it - the fried counterpart to hefeweizen and watermelon.

Tim Horton's Glazed

Tim's glazed (aka, The Honey Dip) wasn’t bad, but it didn’t compare. The dough was fine - if a bit too bready - but the firm, fried exterior had an unpleasant nuttiness which I assume means Tim’s fries with peanut oil; it totally disrupted any harmony between airy dough and glaze, the critical complement in a good raised doughnut.

So Dunkin' wins, hands down. But in all fairness, Tim Horton’s cake doughnuts aren’t bad at all. I picked up a glazed old fashioned in Herald Square today which was loaded with spicy nutmeg and totally worthwhile.

Tim Horton's Glazed Old Fashioned On Smuggled Tim Horton's Plate

Next up: More Voodoo; also, my pal Marc recently suggested I conquer all 12 Tim Horton's in one day. I'm seriously considering.

Return To Voodoo Part 1

Voodoo Doughnut is technically a doughnut shop. But it’s really more of a philosophy. The walls are an intoxicating pink. The patrons tattooed. And the occasionally obscene – and always absurdist – doughnuts come decorated with cereal, Tang, bacon and – before the FDA stepped in – Pepto Bismol. And because all existential milestones are better experienced in the presence of fried dough, Voodoo doubles as a wedding chapel and offers something called a “coffin full of doughnuts,” which I assume is just what it sounds like.

Three years ago my wife surprised me with a first anniversary vow-renewal ceremony at Voodoo. Legally ordained minister and Voodoo co-founder Tres Shannon officiated beneath a massive doughnut altar and a velvet portrait of Isaac Hayes. Fruit Loops were tossed in the air (Get it? Like small doughnuts) and Shannon presented us with a life sized doughnut representation of our cat Dominic. It felt wrong eating the head but we managed. The whole thing is detailed in this five-part post, and here’s our cat in doughnut form:



And his head:



That was our first trip to Portland, and we've wanted to go back ever since. And move there really. Because between the coffee, beer, trees, music and food, it’s just about ideal. This time we decided to tour the entire Pacific Northwest, starting in Portland, moving on to Seattle, and ending up in Vancouver where the Tim Hortons flow like Chinook Salmon. We took the red eye and sat beside a women who, between a frantic cycle of make-up removal and application (“Sorry about the light, I’m putting on my face,” she said around 2:00 AM with a thick New York accent) and the violent shaking of a pill bottle, had to be at least partially insane or withdrawing from something. Hence, we got very little sleep and hit our Ace Hotel mattress hard. First thing in the morning we grabbed a Stumptown in the lobby and headed to Voodoo.

Last time we over-indulged in the cereal-topped varieties I mentioned earlier. Like the one with Cocoa Puffs:


The one with Fruit Loops:


And the one with Captain Crunch:


Insane right? What twisted mind cakes a crunchy mountain of Cocoa Puffs on top of a chocolate frosted?! I wouldn’t be surprised if the lady from our flight moonlights as Voodoo’s baker. But this time we stayed away from cereal, save one encounter with Rice Krispies which I’ll get to later. We instead kicked it off with a simple vanilla-frosted cake doughnut with sprinkles (see Mrs. B holding up top), like the one that symbolized the “ring” in our vow-renewal. The dough was perfectly light and soft with a bold cinnamon-sweet flavor and an airiness rarely seen in cake varieties; it was noticeably better than last time (improved dough recipe?) and instead of our original colored sprinkles flaunted red, white and blue for the 4th.


The rest of our haul – the Marshall Mathers, the bacon maple bar, and a doughnut with a mustache – would have to wait; we had a morally questionable rendezvous with a foie gras doughnut that night and needed to save room.

Stay tuned for Part II

Voodoo Doughnut

Blognut Back on Blogger

After a two-year stint on Wordpress, I’m bringing Blognut back to its original home on Blogger. Partly because www.theblognut.net recently disappeared and all salvage attempts have proven unsuccessful – apparently my database was wiped out – but also because I don’t really understand computers and making pictures of doughnuts appear in my sidebar seems way easier on Blogger.

Posts will resume on a regular basis (stay tuned for Portland, OR Part II!) and I’ll be slowly bringing back any old material I can dig up in my email and hard drive. But first let’s quickly catch up on the major doughnut happenings of the past few months. There was the Dunkin’ Donuts Create Your Own Donut Contest, which Mrs. B and I actually entered. Unfortunately whatever we came up with (which was so good I can’t remember it) lost out to the “Toffee For Your Coffee.” Our friend Marc swears he should have won but claims Dunkin’s “crash-prone server” prevented his inevitable victory. Then there was the news that 13 NYC Dunkin’ locations will soon re-open as Tim Horton’s (the Canadian mega-chain founded and named for the hall of fame hockey legend). And perhaps most notably, there was a truck filled with doughnut glaze that tipped over in Washington State:

Moving Out

Blognut has moved! Please update your links and visit the new and improved www.theblognut.net.

Donuts from a bread lady

Amy's Bread is best known for its artisanal breads, cakes and cookies. But hidden amongst the Rosemary Round Bread and Semolina with Golden Raisins and Fennel in Amy's display case sits an unassuming and often over-looked offering: the Lowfat Apple Sauce Donut.

This plump ball of dough tastes like a cinnamon-heavy spice cake dunked in a juice box full of Motts. The cake dough is dense but not too heavy, and while moist, leaves not a trace of oily residue on my hands. Some of you long-time Blognut readers may remember the Apple Sauce's earlier work - recreating the cover Bob Dylan's Freewheelin' album.


Amy's Bread Locations:

672 Ninth Avenue
(Between 46th & 47th Streets)
New York, NY 10036
Telephone: (212) 977-2670

75 Ninth Avenue
(Between 15th & 16th Streets)
New York, NY 10011
Telephone: (212) 462-4338

250 Bleecker Street
at Leroy Street
New York, NY 10014
Telephone: (212) 675-7802
Fax: (212) 675-7831

Donut Score:

Lowfat Apple Sauce -

Fractured Prunes

The Mid-Atlantic has in recent years become somewhat of a Donut gray zone - you've got DD moving in from the Northeast, and the KK influence from down South, but really no unique Donut identity of its own. Well thanks to a brightly-colored, wrinkly mini-chain, this Donut dearth appears to be quickly vanishing.

The Fractured Prune was started in 1976 in Ocean City, Maryland, and has been supplying hoards of sun screen-coated, fanny pack-toting board-walkers with customized Donut fare ever since. Founder Tom Parshall chose the name to honor a woman named Prunella who once owned much of the land around Ocean City, and who incidentally was the county ping-pong champion in 1895. She also had a penchant for more extreme sports, competing against men in ice skating, skiing and tennis. She was a brittle specimen and would often return from such events in a wheel chair or on crutches, earning her the moniker Fractured Prunella. Why Tom thought it would be a good idea to take this women's name, liken it to the fruit it most resembles and develop a horrifying purple mascot in its honor, I have no idea. Because seriously, could there be a worse name for a Donut shop? But evidently Tom knew what he was doing – his creation has since become a huge regional success, with 12 franchises in Maryland alone, 1 in Virginia, 1 in DC, and a sprinkling of others in places like Ohio, North Carolina and Florida.

What separates the FP from many of its peers is their customer-specific fare – if not happy with menu items patrons can instead chose their own glazes and toppings. It's kind of like the Prune is Wendy's and Dunkin and Krispy are McD's you know?

So over the weekend I was in DC visiting a slew of college/high school friends, many of whom remember me better for my "bagel consuming" tendencies rather than Donut ingestion. But happily I'm able to talk two buddies into accompanying me to the newly-opened Fractured Prune in Dupont Circle. First we've got ACB, a bearded cemetery historian who bears a striking resemblance in temperament and attire to The Dude. Then there's 4-beer Mikey, who earned this designation a few years back after a particularly hideous emetic episode and now enjoys positioning things on the global scale. While my companions only enjoy Donuts on a sporadic basis at best, both have well-groomed palates when it comes to unhealthy sources of energy and are more than helpful in assessing our order:

Now right off the bat I'll say that there's one major flaw in what the Prune has to offer, that being the dough. All of their Donuts are constructed of a simple cake dough with little flavor, save that generic "fried" taste generally reserved for homemade Donuts and Zeppole. But they make up for this lack with an eclectic array of mostly-satisfying toppings.

We start with the Strawberry Shortcake. The sweet and gooey strawberry glaze is a perfect representation of the macerated strawberries generally piled atop a shortcake, and is balanced in taste and texture by crumbled bits of graham cracker. The whole thing is dusted with an extra layer of sweetness in the form of powdered sugar. Our team of tasters is impressed.


Next up, the Morning Buzz. A flavorful mocha glaze covered in Oreo cookie crumbs makes for another fine Donut. But think about it, if you cake something in smashed Oreos, you really can't go wrong in terms of flavor.


The French Toast. I was anticipating this Donut most of all due to my love of both maple glaze and cinnamon-sugar mixtures – both of which smother the Fractured Prune's French Toast variety. All three of us agree it tastes nearly like the real thing.


Blueberry Hill. In true Fats style, the Prune invites diners to "Find Your Thrill" when munching on this one. But all we find is a mess of artificial tasting blueberry sludge and too much powdered sugar.


And for our final two, we create our own. First, the simple Raspberry Glazed echoes the artificiality found in the Blueberry Hill. We've now learned to avoid any unadulterated fruit varieties. And finally, the Honey Glazed with Graham Cracker Crumbs. A sweet, crunchy and wholly satisfying finish.

Before long ACB runs outside in the midst of a sugar fit in search of savory remediation at the Gyro shack next door. Mike and I are left to clean up the detritus of our feast, him gawking at the curvaceous Russian counter girl (sorry Suz) and me with a pant-load of dried glaze stuck to my camera lens.

The Fractured Prune Donut Shoppe
2153 P Street NW
Washington DC

Donut Scores:

Strawberry Shortcake -

Morning Buzz -

French Toast -

Blueberry Hill -

Raspberry Glazed -

Honey Glazed and Graham Crackers -

Happy Anniversary!

Blognut would like to wish Blognut a happy 1 year anniversary.

This idiotic Donut blog has come a long way since its humble beginnings at the Formica tables of the Donut House. From a Tang-flavored Donut in Portland, to a buttermilk high atop a 10,000 foot Hawaiian volcano, to rock-hard Parisian atrocities on the streets of the Left Bank, over the past 12 months I've tried my hardest to provide you, the readers, with the most objective, practical and flavorful Donut commentary I could manage. Hopefully I've convinced some of you of the limitless potential in a wad a fried dough, or at very least helped reinforce your previously existing Donut appreciation. And thanks to all of you who've provided support, recipes, and most importanly, Donut shop recommendations - I owe each and every one of you a coffee and a Donut.

So in honor of Blognut's year anniversary, I've compiled a list of the top ten Donuts I consumed over the past year. Enjoy, and thanks for reading.

#10) The Doughnut Plant - Peanut Butter Glazed with Banana Cream Filling

An Elvis-inspired banana cream-stuffed ring coated in a peanut-y glaze.

#9) Banbury Cross - Cinnamon

Cinnamon crumb goodness in Morman country.

#8) The Donut Pub - Black and White Boston Creme

A donut-y twist on the classic NYC black and white cookie stuffed with Boston's finest.

#7) Yummies Donuts - Honey-Glazed Blossom

Honey-infused cake dough shaped like a boomerang.

#6) Spudnuts - Cherry Cinnamon

A bumpy take on the classic cinnamon bun with cherry-infused glaze.

#5) Voodoo Doughnut - Butter-fingering

Devil's food cake dough dowsed with vanilla frosted and shattered Butterfinger.

#4) Mike's Donuts - Plain Glazed

Simple, sweet and satisfying.

#3) The Doughnut Plant - Tres Leches

Mark Israel's finest creation: butter cake soaked in evaporated milk, condensed milk, and cream, just like the traditional Mexican cake.

#2) Voodoo Doughnut - Dominic the Cat

A one-of-a-kind Voodoo creation modeled after my big-boned feline Dominic.

#1) Spudnuts - Plain Glazed

A cinnamon-spiked, potato flour dough, coated with a subtle glaze straight out of Charlottesville, Virginia. Simply the finest Donut of all. Please disregard the cows.