Spivey's Donuts aka The Donut King: Eufaula, Alabama

Since it is still National Donut Day, my memory has been jogged. I've been horribly tardy in posting this wonderful review from Rebecca Goggans, reviewer for the Oregon contingent. This review comes from a tiny little shop over in her home town in Alabama. She gushed and gushed about this place when we were at the less than stellar Helen Bernard Bakery in Portland. And now that I think about it, I haven't posted that review yet either! Better get on that.

-Renee

Report From Rebecca

Dear Almighty Donut Bloggers,

I called in some unbiased colleagues to help me report on a small, nondescript donut shop in Eufaula Alabama. My assistants were Chris Denune of Brooklyn a self-described New York City foodie and Charette Hebbard, also of Brooklyn, who qualified as an assistant based on her experience avidly eating donuts in Spain, France, South Africa, India, St. Barts, Grenada, Antiqua and 35 of the 50 U.S. states.

On Friday, December 24, we eased down the tree-lined streets by antebellum houses decorated in wreaths and ribbons to The Donut King. Now just so you know, I have been visiting this donut shop for well over 20 years but for Charette and Chris, visiting the shop, instead of having them delivered, was a whole new experience.

They agreed, the plain brown doors, like a plain brown wrapper, opened to the diamond of donuts! Its really great to get there early in the morn, but if you arrive around the time the high school is starting or around 8am when people are going to work, you are gonna’ have to wait and you are gonna’ be challenged by finding a parking spot as there is no parking associated with this establishment – you have to park at the church across the street or the used car lot next door or just pull off to the side of the road. We arrived fairly late in the morning, probably 11:30 Alabama time (which is important to note in this part of the country because Georgia time which is one hour different is only 1 mile away) so there were only three people getting donuts and two people eating chili dogs. Yep, glazed donuts and chili-dogs-that’s about the extent of the menu. Just so you know, the chili dogs are killer too! Let’s talk about ambiance; this is not an ‘order and sit’ kinda’ place. Nope, you just get your donuts and go….or you can stand around in the 24 square feet of floor space eating like the chili-doggers were but I don’t recommend it.

The donut cooker (frier) is about 3 feet by 2 feet. You can watch da’ donuts go in and eat ‘dem as soon as they come out. These warm donuts are absolutely heavenly – like eating cotton candy in donut form. They look like the perfect glazed donut – golden honey colored with light sparkly sugar glaze. The balance of flavors and textures is perfect - light crusty sugary glaze, with an incredible soft mouth feel once your teeth sink past the glaze, light and fluffy dough.

• “The dough is sweet, rich, light”. “So moist - melts in my mouth and in my hand”. Chris
• Can hardly tell its fried – don’t even feel guilty after eating” Charette

We all agreed, bottom-line, ambiance is non-existent but who needs ambiance when you can get donuts like these! Overall rating is 10 out of 10 especially if you get there right when they are coming out of the cooker!