Wawa

Where: 6500 S. Semaron Blvd, Orlando
What: Pumpkin Spice
When: Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Wawas have recently been popping up in Central Florida and it's kind of exciting. Since my sister moved to Philly, I began to understand the obsession my college roommates from New Jersey had with Wawa. The sandwiches are great and the stores are always well lit and super clean for gas station convenience stores. This particular Wawa is just north of Orlando International Airport and for the first couple weeks they were open they kept their gas at 2.99/gallon. Even more amazing when you compare that to the two other stations between them and the airport who regularly charge over $5/gallon to get all those tourists returning their rental cars. Such crap.

Anyways, DONUT REVIEW. Duh. I had the pumpkin spice on the way to the airport leaving Florida. I am so in love with fall and anything pumpkin flavored (or baked goods pumpkin flavored, pumpkin beer is not my favorite). However, the "spice" part of this donut was just too much. I felt like I was eating out of the jar of pumpkin pie spice. I couldn't finish it. The donut was moist and the glaze was nice, but just not a good flavor for me. 2/5. I hope fall has some better pumpkin donuts in store for me.

Publix Bakery

Where: 10615 Narcoossee Rd, Orlando FL
What: Mixed package
When: Saturday, August 31st, 2013

Sometimes I use donuts as a treat for myself. I know you aren't supposed to use food as a reward, but sometimes it makes crappy situations more bearable. I tried to find an actual donut place, but the one listed on Google Maps was no longer there. So Publix had to do.

Publix is the main grocery store chain in Florida, especially the Orlando area. We barely have any other stores. It kind of sucks for competition. Their subs are really good though. People rave about their bakery. I'm not the biggest fan. Probably because my mom really bakes. And my sister. I know what the good stuff tastes like. But I had to try them anyways. Mostly because I was already in the parking lot and I wanted a donut.

The selection was pretty slim. Nothing maple in the display case or the preboxed ones. They had boxes of a half dozen glazed or half dozen chocolate frosted for $2.99 but I went with the box of mixed fancies. Or fancy for a grocery store. There was an apple fritter, a cinnamon long john, a boston creme long john, and a cinnamon roll.

The boston creme was obviously my favorite and the rest were just eh. My family helped me eat them so they went pretty quickly, but I probably wouldn't go back. Florida, you have disappointed me again.

The Clarkson Bakery

Where: 113 Pine St, Clarkson, NE
What: Cherry Kolaches and a Peanut Butter frosted cinnamon roll
When: July 2012

There are certain places that are legendary in my family. The Clarkson Bakery is one of them. If we are up in the West Point area of Nebraska, someone has to go over to the bakery and get some kolacky (which is apparently both the single and plural form of the word according to dictionary.com). For those of you who are confused, kolacky are kind of like danishes without the extra sugar glaze and frosting. And the bakery isn't like just the next town over for all you urbanites. It's like a 30 mile drive down the road for these things. And then back.

So during the last reunion weekend, not only did we get kolacky from the bakery one day while at the hotel, but I actually got to go to the bakery for the first time! Think of the smallest downtown you can think of. That's bigger than Clarkson. The gas station across the street had two pumps that were the old fashioned kind. No awning. No digital screen.

Anyways, the bakery is tiny and doesn't actually have donuts, so I'm sorry if some of you thought this was going to be about donuts. I don't know what would have given you that idea :-) But the kolacky are really good (not super sweet, but good fruit flavor). The cinnamon roll was alright, I'd just stick with the kolacky next time we're in the area. Which will be for next years family reunion!

The Donut Professor

Where: 8410 S 73rd Plaza, Papillion NE
What: Maple raised donut
When: Saturday, August 24, 2013
website

This place is close to my aunt's house and I've driven past it probably a million times. But it was always closed. So last Saturday I hustled over there and barely made it before noon. The selection was probably what you'd expect for a place about to close. In maple my choices were raised or long john. I'm glad I went with raised, because the long john would have been even more of a waste of a donut.

The maple frosting was too sugary and the actual donut was ridiculously dry. It tasted like it had been out for a couple of days, not just hours. I understand a lot of places don't make the donuts in house, but I feel like they should still taste fresh to some degree! I'd say 0/5. Didn't even finish the donut. Attempted to eat just the frosting. You know that's bad when I'd rather just throw it away.

LaMar's, spoiler alert: 3rd time was NOT the charm

Where: 4240 S 48th St, Lincoln
What: Boston Creme
When: Thursday, August 8th, 2013

I had the opportunity to be over near the other LaMar's location in Lincoln a couple of weeks ago and decided I might as well try it. Maybe they have the maple the downtown location advertises BUT DOESN'T HAVE.

They didn't. So since I was there already I got a Boston Creme because I hadn't tried that yet and figured I had already stopped, might as well. Also, I should note that they shared the building with a Goodrich that wasn't in a Subway! Maybe I should have just gotten a malt instead. But it wasn't Monday, which is apparently Malt Day? I didn't ask about the specials. Maybe there'll have to be a 4th time...

The chocolate frosting was good, the creme was just eh. In fact, I'm not positive if it really was a Boston Creme for real, but maybe just a bavarian creme? It just didn't have a lot of flavor. It wasn't overly sugary, just almost like pudding that was made with too much milk or something. Also, it was almost $2. In Lincoln, that is too much for a donut. 2/5.

Sun Mart Foods

Where: 1340 West O St, Lincoln
What: Maple cups? It had a weird name...
When: Thursday, August 15, 2013

I've been very bad about posting reviews recently, mainly because I'm almost out of new places in Lincoln to review and I haven't had any trips recently either! But I think this is the first of three reviews I have waiting to go, so I'll try to be quicker with them!

I was actually trying to go to a place called Randy's Donuts this morning in northwest Lincoln, but it was closed. Not sure if it was permanently or because it was 11:30am already by the time I got there. So instead I went to the grocery store in the same parking lot since I didn't think I'd had one of their donuts before.

They only thing that they had that was maple was this huge looking donut pastry hybrid thing that was easily 6 inches in diameter and pushing 3 inches tall. (Quick! Calculate the volume based on a roughly cylindrical shape! Go!)

Anyways, the frosting was a little much. In volume that is. The flavor was perfect, but it was quick thick. The pastry part was really good, kind of like a croissant but not as buttery. It was $1.25, which was kind of pricey for me as most of you know. I forgot to even look at how much normal donuts cost. Man, I'm not good at this whole complete review thing...

But here are pictures to make up for it. I'd say 4/5, but don't eat it all in one sitting. This may last awhile...

Target

Where: 8201 S. 40th St, Lincoln
What: Glazed Old Fashioned
When: Sunday, August 4, 2013

First of all, I made the mistake of going to Target the week before school started here in Lincoln. When all the school supplies were majorly discounted. And every family in a 3 mile radius was back to school shopping. At the Super Target.

It was a little stressful. Especially since I don't know where everything is there yet and my list had some weird things on it (carpet cleaner...for that pack of chik fil a sauce I may have stepped on while cleaning the day before...)

So obviously, it was a donut day. Despite having a fairly large food and bakery section, the donut selection sucked. There may have been four varieties to choose from and none of them looked super appetizing. Perhaps because some of them had weird purple frosting on them. If you need fancy colors to draw attention to your donuts, you aren't making them right.

I went with the glazed old fashioned because it looked decent and simple enough. It was 89 cents if I recall correctly. And possibly the worst 89 cents I ever spent. It was too sugary on the outside and too doughy on the inside. Not a lot of flavor (besides Sugar, which should only be a flavor for cookies). 1/5.