The Crème Brûlée Doughnut

At one point in my childhood, my parents owned a mini food court with three fast food restaurants. They ran Osaka, a Japanese restaurant, and rented out the two other spaces. One was Dunkin' Donuts (which eventually was rented out by Honey Dew Donuts) and the other was a sandwich place.

Evidently, I consumed a lot of doughnuts. My mom would bring back boxes of them after work since they were going to get thrown out anyway. My favorite was the Boston Cream doughnut, chocolate frosted and filled with custard. I definitely ate too many as a kid, so as I grew up I steered clear of cream-filled doughnuts choosing to go with glazed or maple frosted.

My first foray back into filled doughnuts was actually Doughnut Plant's Tres Leches doughnut (a cake doughnut filled with three sweet creams, named after the Spanish Tres Leches cake). I was really skeptical of a cake doughnut, since I prefer the softer, glazed kind, but it became my favorite doughnut at Doughnut Plant.

Today, I went to get a Tres Leches doughnut, and gasped out loud, "They're sold out!" when I saw that there weren't anymore in the case. It may have been a blessing in disguise since I decided to the crème brûlée doughnut. These were blogged about in the Times back in November.

The crème brûlée doughnut at Doughnut Plant may be a contender for my new favorite doughnut. Filled with smooth vanilla custard and topped with sugar that's been blowtorched (just like crème brûlée!), it's like a textural explosion in your mouth. It's soft, creamy and crunchy! Plus, it isn't as big as the regular doughnuts there, so you won't feel guilty about getting two.



P.S. I would call first if you are planning on going first thing in the morning. I read a post on Serious Eats that they went in the early morning and they weren't ready yet.


Doughnut Plant
379 Grand St. (at Clinton)
New York, NY 10002
212-505-3700
doughnutplant.com