Donuts

Donuts, more traditionally spelled doughnuts¹, are arguably the most unhealthy treat on the planet. Freshly made donuts can be purchased at:

• Save-Mart sells their own brand of donuts.

• The Coffee House, but they disappear quickly.

• The Silo has donuts, near the Starbuck's cashiers.

• Fast and Easy Mart. According to the clerk, "they are delivered by some guy from Sacramento."
  

• The raspberry jelly donuts have more dough than jelly. Although the jelly is overly viscous and looks artificial, the donut quality is fair, especially given they are sold in a convenience store.
  

• The chocolate glazed donuts are pretty generic, and sometimes are raw in the middle.

• Fluffy Donuts
  

• The raspberry jelly donuts consistently have a generous amount of jelly. They are available early in the day, but tend to run out more quickly than bearclaws and the like.
  

• The filling of the bavarian cream donut has the same type of slight chemical taste found in instant pudding mixes.

• Konditorei
  

• They sell only one item that could be considered a donut, a custard-filled pastry. Its dough matches the high standards set by the rest of their offerings. The custard filling is fresh, creamy, tastes slightly like butterscotch, and has a subtle hint of alcohol (vanilla extract?).

• Safeway
  

• The raspberry jelly donuts are very similar to those sold in the Fast and Easy Mart, and are suspected to be delivered by the same guy in Sacramento.

• Variety Donuts
  

• The oddest raspberry jelly donuts in Davis— a solid donut is sliced in half and spread with jelly. Donut engineers typically avoid such "sandwich" designs as they promote leakage of the 360-degree kind.

• A few Gas Stations throughout Davis have Krispy Kreme doughnuts, but beware— they sometimes forget to fill the jelly ones! They also often have boxes of chocolate or powder sugar coated lumps of "donuts": dense, compressed and prone to bouts of crying. Some people like them, however. Some people also really like the early heavy metal period of Michael Bolton.

* UC Davis Graduate Students consume many donuts at Coffee-Bagel-Donut Day, as well as other non-donut donut shaped objects.

A most rare and delicious import.

Dunkin' Donuts has a higher density out east than Starbucks™ does here (and is also the number one donut chain). In some urban areas, you can find several on each block. Despite this, they don't have the "take over the world™" vibe that Starbucks™ has, possibly because they give franchisers quite a bit of leeway in how they run their stores, including some that are full diners. Due to their ubiquity and friendliness, they have quite a large number of diehard fans. (So does Tim Horton in Canada and the extreme northern states). Unfortunately, there are no Dunkin' Donuts in the area, and so people coming back from the east coast or midwest often bring back donuts or coffee for locals. Different donuts are made from different types of dough and cooked for different lengths of time, so each variety is very distinct, some being yeasty, some being cakey, some being crumbly, others being eggy. Dunkin' Donuts also makes bagels, croissants and, at most stores, soup and sandwiches. They are also commonly open 24 hours.

Supposedly, the closest Dunkin' Donuts is in Phoenix, AZ, approximately 800 miles away from Davis. Actually, there are two in Portland, OR (though they are not listed on the official website), which is only 570 miles from Davis. There is also one in Escondido, CA (approximately 500 miles) (does anyone know the address??). Though it, too, is not listed on the website, the store was there as of early June 2007. There was one in Sacramento and one in LA that were test locations (they got redecorated and re-laid out every month or so). The plan was to open a light sprinkling of 800 stores throughout California to get the ball rolling. There was a section on the website about the new California stores coming soon. Unfortunately, the man financing the venture had a heart attack and the project was put on hold and eventually the locations closed. JabberWokky has repeatedly offered to road trip to Dunkin' Donuts. For those who think Starbucks has a high density, many east coast cities have a much higher density of Dunkin' Donuts than Starbucks does anywhere. Southern Ontario has a higher density of Tim Horton's than any other store in any other location I've encountered. Note that Togos and Baskin-Robbins are both owned by the same company, so if they offer coffee (none of the Davis locations do), it is Dunkin' Donuts coffee.

Old databases list the closest Dunkin Donuts as being in San Jose, at 3605 Union Ave. They used to be a Dunkin Donuts, but several years ago lost their franchise and became a Sunny Donuts. JabberWokky spent a night very happy, followed by bitter disappointment when he found out the truth.

• According to The Boston Herald (7/21/2002), "Dunkin' expanded in California in the 1980s, with about 15 stores around the state at one time. But it never got the critical mass it hoped for and bailed out a few years ago." I remember Dunkin Donuts growing up, and their coffee is quite good and their donuts tended to be uneven in quality. But apparently the second run at the California market they envisioned in 2k2 never materialized (as far as I know). -jr
  

• There's a Dunkin' Donuts in San Jose... did I miss something?
  

• Yes, it is not longer a Dunkin Donuts, and has not been for a few years. It's still listed in some phone books and online as a Dunkin Donuts, but you can call them to verify - they aren't. They are now "Sunny Donuts". —JabberWokky
  

• What he said. Sunny donuts is only like a few minutes from my home in San Jose. - TF

• When I was a kid, there was a Dunkin Donuts in Grass Valley, a mere 75 miles away from Davis. I had no idea they were such a huge company. I always thought they were a little shady. Maybe it was the orange plastic chairs and dark brown walls, haha. — ss

• It's time to make the donuts! —DavidGrundler

• These can be purchased and traveled to you by friends needing a ride from the airport after breaks. ~DavePoole