la.foodblogging

Back in October, I played a little game with myself (yeah, I don’t have a lot of friends). The game was called “Guess the Next Food Trend” and my guess, for the successor to cupcakes and “natural” frozen yogurt, was gourmet donuts. Well, the food gods must have been listening because a couple of weeks later, Beverly Hills was blessed with Fritelli’s Donuts & Coffee, a gourmet donut shop of exactly the type I had wished for.

Since we decided to expand our horizons and visit the Beverly Hills farmer’s market this weekend, rather than our local, we decided it would be the perfect opportunity to try the fancy donuts. One previous attempt had failed, as we arrived too late and I walked in to see only a couple of maple donuts and four donut holes, having arrived after prime feeding time. But this time we got there while we still had a full range of choices and the only sadness was that trying them all would cause all of my arteries to instantly clog irreparably.

However, as soon as my eye was caught by that pink lovely you see above, my choice was made. The perfect donut of my childhood - the donut by which I measure all other donuts - was a pink donut. It was a cake donut with cherry glaze frosting from Sunshine Donuts in San Luis Obispo. And I don’t mean an artificial flavored, pink food dye frosting. I mean real cherries, which you could tell by the tiny flecks of red you could find if you studied the frosting closely, which, after roughly 1,284 of those pink donuts, I had ample opportunity to do.

So when I saw the raspberry glaze frosting donut in that princess shade of pink, it was destined to be mine. As you can see, it’s rather tall for a donut. It was like the poodle of donuts - very girly and impossibly fluffy. I would have preferred the smaller, denser, more traditional cake, because I like a more balanced frosting to cake ratio. But it was light and the fruity glaze was delicious. Unique in flavor, but not so different that it was too crazy.

I’d like to say that’s where my donut indulgence ended, but actually, I got a “vanilla latte” cake donut as well. This was more the proper size and proportion but I have to admit it didn’t taste much different from your average donut store donut, and was twice as expensive.

My companion got a Meyer lemon zest glaze donut and a cinnamon crumb donut. I asked him for a quote about how they were, and he said: “I don’t have a quote.” But he did say that he likes Bob’s in the Farmer’s Market better. I would agree, except that I like the fruit glazes far more than the chocolate glaze I usually get at Bob’s. I would call it a tie, with Bob’s getting the edge based on price and it’s convenient location (for me–perhaps not for you). My companion especially recommends the crumb donuts at Bob’s

I would say that Fritelli’s would be a special occasion donut place for me. The donut’s are $1-$2 and I wouldn’t say that they are so out-of-this-world that I would regularly pay that price for them. But the unusual flavors are a plus.

For those romantics in the crowd, I will say that I want to go back around Valentine’s Day when Fritelli’s will have special red velvet cake donuts with red, pink, or white glaze and white or red sprinkles. Okay, that I have to see. And taste. That I will pay a buck for.

Fritelli’s Donuts & Coffee
350 N. Canon Dr. #6
Beverly Hills, CA
(310) 276-1408

http://www.frittelli.com

By KT (see more of her posts). You can find more of KT's writing at her own website Gastronomy 101.