The Fried Dough Ho

Bob’s Donut and Pastry Shop is one of those establishments that is a stalwart landmark in San Francisco. It the place that my darling Lisa acquired my giant Birthday Doughnut. Not only do that have giant doughnuts as novelties, Bob’s provides the best quality, hand-made, classically-prepared doughnuts in the city. These are not gourmet doughnuts with unusual flavors like Voodoo or Gourdoughs. You won’t find anything with bacon or childrens cereal as a topping.

The interior is incredibly old fashioned; just a plain counter with a handful of two-seater chairs lining the wall. There is an old sign on the back wall worth looking at which reads “Cheaper by the Dozen – Plain, Powered, Maple, Glazed, Raised, Crullers, Crunch, Brownies. Take Home a Dozen. 2 for 15¢” I would have thought earlier, but they have been in existence since the 1960s. And the bulk of their business is not the morning crowd, but the late-night club-hoppers.

This is a stalwart favorite for a reason. The quality of their doughnuts is exceptional. Slightly misshapen indicates they are hand formed. The cake offerings are dense and rich with a moist crumb. The crullers are light and eggy and ethereally enticing. And then there is the apple fritter. Outside of Randy’s Doughnuts in Los Angeles, this is the best apple fritter I have experienced. It is a tad thicker than I prefer, but it has all the requisite dark crunchy bites that make a fritter fabulous.

Like Mrs Johnsons in Austin, if you go late at night, you can get these doughnuts fresh and warm. Many doughnut shops are preparing doughnuts throughout the evening for sale in the morning, but there are few establishments that enable you to acquire these warm, decadent morsels as they are being made. Kudos for Bob’s for staying open, for longevity, and for excellence.

Hunt’s Quality Doughnuts

Originally uploaded by the nicole harvey

Compliments of the delightful Miss Nicole, I offer this little ditty today. Apparently there was some construction — or, I should say, deconstruction — in the Mission District of San Francisco which revealed this old sign. It is hard to date it, based on fonts. My artistic temperament implies something earlier than the 1950s. The thin lines of the fonts and the odd Chinese lanterns interjected between the painted doughnuts reek of the late 1920s or mid 1930s.

And the doughnuts are thin. By the 1950s, doughnuts were thicker. I know this from movies that I have watched. There seem to be a lot of Depression-era movies with doughnut scenes and in the 1930s, the doughnuts were thinner.

Regardless, I thank Nicole for sending this to me so that I could share it with you. I’m tickled pink!

I feel a little ashamed. I visited Voodoo Doughnuts back in February, during a trip up through the Pacific Northwest and it has taken me an awfully long time to getting around to documenting that visit. I was pretty excited to visit this brick-clad temple of fried dough as their Maple Bacon Bar is one of the most acclaimed in the doughnut world. I loved visiting Voodoo; the interior has ouija boards and a giant, hilarious sculpture. It is irreverent in all its offerings; giant glazed doughnuts with tongues sticking out at you, demonic pentagrams painted in icing, and frosting colors that are never found in nature.

The sexually-suggestive names ascribed to these painted wonders are equally humorous; Triple Chocolate Penetration is a chocolate cake doughnut, topped with chocolate frosting and Coco-Puffs cereal, Old Dirty Bastard is raised doughnut with chocolate frosting topped with Oreo cookies and peanut butter, Cock-N-Balls is a raised doughnut shaped — well, you can figure it out — like it belongs on a porno shoot. These are novelty doughnuts taken to extreme and very little offered at Voodoo is not irreverent.

I went to Voodoo twice during my trip. The first time was just for myself and my friend, Ralph, who had offered his couch to me during my trip. We tasted the famous Bacon Bar and when obtained fresh (i.e., the bacon is still crispy), it is quite exceptional. I also ordered a Voodoo Doll, raised yeast freakishly-shaped jelly-filled that is oddly decorated complete with a pretzel stake impaled through its heart. We tasted the Mango Tango, a raised yeast doughnut filled with mango jelly and topped with vanilla frosting. Of all, this had the most intriguing flavor; tangy and bright, it was an unexpected flavor for a doughnut.  And I ordered the Apple Fritter, that which I benchmark all doughnut shops. It was here that Voodoo sort of faltered as it was just too thick and cakey without that requisite consistent crunch and rich apple flavor that the Ho requires.

A week after my first Voodoo visit, I returned, this time to purchase more than a dozen offerings to bring home to my San Francisco buddies. What came with me (or was eaten en route home), included the Triple Chocolate Penetration, Grape Ape, and Tangfastic. The Grape Ape and Tangfastic are topped with flavored powdered sugars which are a bit over-the-top for my tastes. There is a point where the garnish overwhelms the actual fried dough. They are all indeed very memorable but are they all great doughnuts? Not necessarily. Like my trip to Gourdoughs in Austin, I can appreciate the novelty factor of certain flavors and garnishes. But there is a point where some flavors are just too much. I think those doughnuts with the children’s cereal, powdered Tang, bubble gum, or M&Ms are fun, but the flavors are too sickly sweet. The maple bacon, however, is a true joy and the quality of the basic cakes are exceptional. And, they offer Vegan options which is fabulous.

At least, filmmaker Jaxon Defa believes the world can be saved through doughnuts. I stumbled upon this “mockumentary” within YouTube and I have repeatedly reached out to the gentleman whom I believe made the film to talk to him about it, but I have yet to hear back from him. If anyone knows him, have him drop me a line; I’d love to interview him. But until then, I will share a pretty hilarious 8 1/2 minutes with you. It includes everything from sexual obsession to poetry to philosophy. And as a piece of film making, it isn’t bad either. Congratulations, Jaxon, wherever you are.

My last doughnut stop in Austin was truly a special one. It was recommended to us by the lady selling us macarons at La Boite and is called Mrs. Johnson’s Bakery. What makes it special is a variety of things, mostly that fresh, warm doughnuts are available after 9:00 p.m. in the evening. And so we waited until after the sun had set for my epic journey towards Fried Dough Ho’dom.

Driving through the streets of Austin, there was a PBS radio station on the car radio playing tunes of the 1950s and I felt as though I were in the George Lucas movie, American Graffiti; this was as much about the journey as the destination. When we arrived, I could already smell the aroma of hot sugar in the air and I spied the sign which indicated that Mrs. Johnson’s had been around since 1948 and the building helped confirm that sense of nostalgia. In the front window was a long machine which rolled out the dough and cut the slab into its octagonal shapes. I watched the worker deftly pulling out the holes from the freshly-hewn rounds. All this joy and wonderment and I was not even inside yet.

What I was faced with surprised me; the full production of doughnut manufacturing going at full steam. It was so oddly gratifying and heartfelt. I was giddy and my enthusiasm was contagious. Enraptured at the scene, I watched closely as one worker organized the holes while another was laying out trays of freshly-cut rounds to be risen. And then another grabbed a giant bowl of dough and it dawned on me that my camera had the video record function. So I am pleased to share my first personal recording of doughnut preparation on Fried Dough Ho:

They knew I was a die-hard enthusiast. Ordering a small selection to take home and taste, the guy behind the counter put an extra doughnut in my box as well as one in my hand before I left. A freshly fried and glazed raised octagon of deliciousness, the warm doughnut in my hand was light and tender. Oh — and did I tell you it was WARM? Other than full-on restaurant offerings, I can’t think of when I have ever had a warm doughnut. I know that was the big selling point for Krispy Kreme for all those years, but in California, I never tried one fresh, only old and cold and mediocre.

What came home to try besides the warm glazed raised was a jelly-filled, chocolate cake, plain cake, and apple fritter. Someone else recommended the apple fritter and sadly, it just did not stand up to my benchmark fritter, Randy’s doughnuts in Los Angeles. Here the apples were indeed canned and fake and it was over spiced with too much cinnamon. The two cake doughnuts however, were exceptional. With a tight, moist crumb, the chocolate was slightly oily but not in a way that I found derogatory whatsoever. Instead, it made it richer and headier. The same dough used in the raised glazed was also that in the jelly doughnut and again, I was perfectly thrilled with this smaller-than-usual sized doughnut. Intensely light and fluffy, the raspberry filling was undoubtedly canned and mass-produced, but not overly sweet and perfectly acceptable.

I have had many mass-produced doughnuts, but these were a cut above. Fresh and warm aside, there was an inherent quality in the knowledge of the fact that these doughnuts were hand-made and not entirely machine-manufactured. And that hand-made quality is discernible, providing a level of excellence and satisfaction. There is much to be said for the vintage atmosphere of the building, the equipment, and the surroundings. Perhaps it was the music I was listening to or hearkening back to an era of simplified goodness, but Mrs Johnson’s certainly helps give the consumer that passionate level of contentment with its doughnuts.