Hot Fresh Donuts

Here in the South, Krispy Kreme cornered the market on donuts years ago. I grew up with Krispy Kremes. High school bands sold them to raise funds. Every trip to Birmingham involved a stop a the angular, fly-specked building we knew as “the Krispy Kreme.”

At the time, we considered Krispy Kreme to be the local boys. We shunned Dunkin’ Donuts, for example, calling them “the chains.” Those were the good old days, back when a glance at the distinctive green and white box told you whether your donuts were good … or evil.

Today, of course, Krispy Kreme, now in the process of taking over the country, has become the Evil Empire. Friends from New York, where the KK shops recently made their first appearance, brag about their “new donut place,” unaware that their cutting-edge innovation is a decades-old tradition in the South.

Down here, we’re left with a dilema: now that Krispy Kreme has become the glazed or sprinkled equivalent of Starbucks, where do you go for a truly local donut?

Here in Jackson, one shop, Pillow Donuts, opened a few months ago. (We spent some time debating whether the store, once open, would sell desserts … or those round, inflatible cushions favored by hemorrhoid sufferers.) I’ve tried four times to sample their wares, stopping by as early as 10:45. Each time, I’m greeted by a sign: “Open at 7:00, and we close when we run out.”

If you’re closed by 10:45, honey, you need to be frying up bigger batches.

Anyway, friends tell us Pillow Donuts taste like biscuits double-dunked in sugary glaze. Me? I’m not a biscuit-eater … so I’ve been looking for an alternative.

Last week, next door to our regular shushi place, a woman named Kim opened The Donut Hut. Curious, I stopped in. In the parking lot, I encountered an elderly man and woman vigorously licking their fingers.

Once inside, a large Pentecostal woman — the only other customer in the place — turned to me and said, “You been in here before?”

“No, m’am.”

“Kim!” she shouted. “First timer!” She gave me a toothy grin. “I been in here twice today. I love these donuts; you gonna love ’em, too.”

Behind the counter, Kim appeared: a diminutive Chinese woman. Beaming, she handed me a glazed donut. “Here,” she said. “Here, here.”

Kim’s glaze is very sticky and very thin. The donut itself is soft, chewy, and a little dry. Still, since I’m not one for glazed donuts anyway, I buy two chocolate frosted donuts … just to be sure.

“You want coffee with that?” Kim asks, ever the entrepreneur.

“No, thanks.”

She nods at her refrigerated drink case. “Water? Yoo Hoo?”

“No, thanks,” I say, handing over my cash.

Once home, I open the grease-spotted paper bag and sample my donut of choice. Kim frosts, but does not glaze, her chocolate donuts; the result, once again, strikes me as dry and a little too chewy.

Later, we meet friends for dinner, and I relate my Donut Hut story.

“Not a Krispy Kreme, eh?”

In the end, I’m forced to give the Devil his due. “Nope,” I say. “Not a Krispy Kreme.”