The East Bay Donut Situation

Since I was in high school, Colonial Donuts on Lakeshore has been the go to spot for donuts in the east bay. I never thought their donuts were extraordinary, but the culture of the place made it a destination. They're open 24 hours, every day (even holidays, I asked) and draws a huge variety of customers. Lakeshore is a diverse street, being on the border of super wealthy and lower middle class neighborhoods. Go in any hour, day or night, and there are sure to be some characters.

I went to University of Oregon in Eugene, which is one of the few cities that hosts a Voodoo Donuts. Voodoo is sort of infamous. Their donuts are extra glutenous and they sometimes get criticized for their ridiculously sugary glaze and their gimmicky approach to selling donuts. I'll say this: I'm a fan of Voodoo and all they have to offer. The price point isn't anything out of the ordinary and their donuts are good. I understand how they offend some palates, but being a total sweet tooth, I love them.

So I came back to Oakland after four years and lo and behold, it's gentrified to all hell. I love great cuisine, and I think that gentrification, while culturally devastating, is good for the culinary world. Restaurants that deserve it stick around, a lot of new ones pop up and go through the ringer, and only the best stand the test of rising cost of living.

I expected two things from this development (in terms of donuts): 

1. Colonial Donuts would crumble (or at least take a blow)

2. New, artisan donut shops would open

However, this was not the case. In fact, I learned more about the poor state of donuts in the east bay and larger bay area by looking for evidence of this.

First, I'll address how I was wrong about Colonial.

So Colonial Donuts is still open and thriving. Go in at any hour and it's popping off. The only sign of any struggle on their part that I've seen is the addition of the infamous "bacon maple" flavor, whose creation is often attributed to Voodoo. That may even be a sign of them flourishing. Investing in a new ingredient and work shopping a new flavor could mean they had some funds to spare. It's gimmicky, sure, but other than that nothing has changed.

Upon searching for other donut shops, I noticed that Colonial's quality was comparatively better than expected. I won't call out any specific locations, but the vast majority of donut shops are not up to par when compared to the Lakeshore location. Colonial, while perhaps nothing special, actually makes decent and consistent donuts. The care goes into the glazing process.

With all this in mind, and ignoring the obvious cultural and nostalgic significance of Colonial Donuts on Lakeshore, I would go so far as to say Colonial is the benchmark donut of the bay area. If a shop's donuts are not as good as Colonial's, that shop is not worth visiting.

Now to address the second misconception.

Oakland certainly attracts its fair share of artisan shops, which is great. Sure it raises the cost of living and encourages wasteful spending, but from the palate perspective, it's great.

I expected there to be at least one new donut shop to open that could compete with the best of the best. I don't mean be as good as the best existing in Oakland, I mean compete with "Du's Donuts" in Williamsburg or "Blue Star" in Portland.

What have I found?

Not much so far. Yelp has pointed out a few promising spots, but none really offer anything that points to perfectionists in the kitchen. No shop has exhibited the passion that Wiley Dufresne has shown.

Here's the video of Dufresne talking about his passion.

The spots that I have checked out so far are Donut Savant, Sweet Belly, and soon I'll visit Donut Farm. All three meet the standards of what I'm looking for on paper. They are new, hipster, and boast care for Instagram worthy donuts. That sounds disgusting, I know, but I've also found that the more photo worthy a donut, the better it is. Plain and simple, someone willing to put the effort into perfecting a donut's presentation will have perfected the flavor as well.

So Donut Savant is great, but they focus so much on being unique that they fall flat in a lot of departments that are important for donut success. The donuts are stupid expensive, tiny, don't actually resemble donuts, and I'm sorry but if you're going to put all that effort in to show off how unique your donuts are they had better be the best donuts ever, which these are not. They're great, the flavors are unique, but no one is going to crave your petite fours if they want a donut. Is it worth checking out? Not really. I sampled a half dozen and was left disappointed.
For reference, the box to the right is about six inches long, so these donuts are pretty tiny. That would be fine if they were cheaper and really knocked it out of the park, but they aren't and they don't really.

Sweet belly on the other hand made fantastic donuts, but they have no confidence in them. They're overly focused on the presentation and totally forgot about the whole "how am I supposed to eat this" part. I loved the donut, but the ice cream wasn't my favorite. The toppings immediately fell off the tower of soft serve, the donut was not solidly attached to anything and fell on the table as well, the whole thing was sort of a let down. These picture perfect creations often are, I think. The donut was amazing though. It was warm, soft, sweet, flavorful. It delivered the promised taste and then some. The fact that it fell kinda killed it for me. Also, they only ever have two flavors (maybe three, I can't quite remember) and they're mini donuts, and they're expensive. The donut was good, but If I'm gonna go there and just order donuts I'm going to feel like I'm missing out. Especially given the cost.

Donut Farm is promising. Their flavors are on point, some weird and some classic. The mexican hot chocolate, a classic sign of a hipster try-hard donut shop, was not too sweet, somewhat spicy, hit the marks. The candy cap had a delicious maple flavor and the glaze was balanced between soft and maleable and crunchy. Not an easy feat. The pitfall of most vegan desserts isn't in the flavor, however, but the texture. While the outside was crunchy, and the glaze was perfect, the dough itself was a little gritty. If they didn't market it as vegan, could I tell the difference? Yes, based on the texture alone. It's great that a vegan donut place such as this exists, but this isn't filling the donut void. Still waiting on a new place to open.

*Other friends I went here with could not tell they were vegan, liked the crunchiness and the flavor, and would recommend them. If I were to recommend any of these spots, it would be this one.