National Donut Day!

Hey, so I know the new look of the site is really bad. At least it looks incredibly disproportioned on my computer, I'll get to work on that really soon.

And let me just get this out of the way...

Remember, Remember the Fifth of November
Remember, remember, the fifth of November
The gunpowder treason and plot,
I see no reason why gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot.

That's right, today is November 5th and I know it seems like I do a lot of these national food day entries, but what is more important and relevant than taking time out of your day in order to properly reflect on any given food and it's national, NATIONAL I SAY, day of celebration. And today is especially important. It's donut day. It's the day of donuts. Yes! And let there be, on this holiest of days, no differences or ill intent held between those who spell it donut or doughnut. Please, I want to blood shed on national donut day.

"A doughnut, or donut, is a sweet, deep-fried piece of dough or batter. The two most common types are the torus-shaped ring doughnut and the filled doughnut, a flattened sphere injected with jam/jelly, cream, custard, or another sweet filling. A small spherical piece of dough, originally made from the middle of a ring doughnut, may be cooked as a doughnut hole." (Wikipedia, again)

I can't imagine how a description of heaven would differ from the words above. I seriously cannot. I mean there'd have to be some mention of... well, let's just move on.

There are two kinds of ring donuts made in this world: cake and yeast. Yeast-donuts are, as you guessed, left to raise like yeast bread. They take longer to cook and have a higher oil content after frying, but have less fat in the starting dough. They also, because of the yeast, bigger when they come out of the fryer. Cake donuts take shorter to cook and are made of a thick, special kind of cake batter. Krispy Kreme donuts are fried yeast-based donuts that are baked for a very short time before frying, a process called proofing. There are also entirely baked donuts, but you can't seriously try and compare frying versus baking. No way.

Then there are different shapes of donuts, such as the rectangular long johns, solid-centered filled donuts, pinwheels, and cruellers. God, how I love cruellers.

The donut was supposedly introduced to the States by the Dutch, who are also responsible for cookies, cream pies, and cobblers. Thank you, Denmark. However, there is archaeological evidence that donuts were prepared by Native Americans in the Southwest. Go figure. Then there are the contemporary cultural differences in preparations of fried cakes. In Hawaii, they have balls of fried dough that are filled often with cremes or other flavored custards called malasadas. I stayed at school near the small bakery that had what was voted Hawaii's best malasadas. We'd walk to this bakery, I can't remember the name, and order half a dozen chocolate or custard filled malasadas, all coated with sugar, still warm from the fryer and quickly turning the box transparent. This was the most amazing experience I'd had since I grew up going to Dunkin Donuts growing up. See, we don't have Dunkins out in Cali, so I have been without its goodness for quite some time.

Favorite donut eating technique? Experience? I have a few. I love getting a cake donut and dipping it into coffee and cream. My favorite experience was walking to the Hawaiian bakery and getting fresh malasadas at 7 in the morning. You simply cannot beat it.

Cheers!