Doughnuts are one of life’s simple pleasures — and having a local doughnut shop in your neighborhood makes life just a touch sweeter.
To satisfy your sweet tooth, and celebrate National Doughnut Day on June 5, we’ve put together a guide to a dozen-plus cities (presented in no particular order) that can feed your doughnut craving.
1. Honolulu, HI
Honolulu’s Diamond Head/Kapahulu/St. Louis district is known for its diverse mix of people, parks, and houses. One sweet resident, Leonard’s Bakery, has been serving up its specialty — malasadas, Portuguese-influenced sugar doughnuts without holes in the center — since opening in 1952, seven years before Hawaii became a U.S. state.
2. Wells, ME
With an average home listing price of $185,000, you can make an affordable move to this small town — the third oldest in the state — and still have enough dough left over to try all 32 doughnut flavors at family-owned Congdon’s Family Restaurant & Bakery.
First on our list? Chocolate honey.
3. Woodbury, CT
In this traditional New England town, you’ll be transported back in time when you kick back with a traditional glazed doughnut from 1950s-inspired Dottie’s Diner. The doughnut will set you back just 90 cents, while the median home listing price in the area, filled with mid-20th-century homes, is $249,950.
At the Donut Stop, the crowd favorite is the Cinnamon Glob: a lump of doughnut dough mixed with cinnamon. Nearby real estate prices are pretty sweet as well. In the surrounding LeMay neighborhood, $99,000 will get you a three-bedroom, one-bath single-family home.
Home of the famous Bluebird Café, Nashville’s Green Hills neighborhood also boasts many ranch-style homes. After an evening listening to the sweet sounds of local musicians, satisfy your sweet tooth with a trip to nearby Fox’s Den Donuts, which bakes up doughnuts in flavors like maple bacon and chocolate-covered crème fill.
With flavor names like Outlaw (lemon cream cheese, cherry icing, and brown butter crumb topping), Chart Topper (peanut butter and sriracha), and Femme Fatale (fresh raspberry curd and vanilla icing), it’s fitting that the jazzy Glam Doll Donuts is located in the young, funky neighborhood of Whittier. With a median age of 27, the area is also home to the Minneapolis College of Art and Design.
On ritzy King Street in downtown Charleston, Glazed Gourmet bakes up sweet Southern flavors, from sweet corn and blueberry to lemon pistachio. To be a Lowcountry local, you’ll have to spend between $800 and $1,000 per month in rent. Go ahead, splurge on a couple of Glazed Gourmet doughnuts on Saturday mornings.
Open at 5:30 a.m. daily, Long’s Bakery in Indianapolis understands that West Side residents get down to business early. This little neighborhood is perfect for anyone looking to travel back to the middle of the 20th century — the majority of homes date from the 1950s, and the bakery accepts cash only.
The majority of people in this Hollywood, FL, suburb are married and in their late 30s or early 40s with moderate mortgages. The local doughnut shop, Mojo Donuts, caters to its audience with kid-friendly flavors like s’mores and oversized birthday doughnuts the size of a cookie sheet.
10. Durham, NC
Beer and doughnuts is the perfect pairing in Old West Durham, a neighborhood in Durham, NC, that’s a little hipster, a little nerdy, but overwhelmingly young and affordable. Head to Monut’s Donuts to take a taste. Might we suggest the salted caramel doughnut paired with a coffee stout or the strawberry shortcake with a glass of rosé?
11. Louisville, KY
The historically German neighborhood of Schnitzelburg sticks to its roots. Here, Nord’s Bakery is famous for its glazed doughnuts in the shape of large pretzels. For less than a dollar a doughnut, you can walk back to your $500-a-month apartment and indulge.
12. Decatur, GA
When Revolution Doughnuts opened in 2012, the dining scene in Decatur was transformed for doughnut lovers. Our dream afternoon? A fresh peach slider — a slice of Georgia peach between two lightly powdered yeast-style doughnut rounds — eaten on a walk through the tree-lined streets, back to a Victorian-era home.
13. Richmond, VA
Sugar Shack Donuts, located in Richmond’s Newtowne West neighborhood, tells it like it is. Tastes Like a SamoaTM tastes like, well, a Samoa Girl Scout cookie. With a median age of 26, a majority of residents here rent homes for around $600 a month.
14. Santa Fe, NM
Live along the commuter rail or rail-trail bike path, where you can score a home for less than $350,000. If you do, you’re bound to become a regular at Whoo’s Donuts. Try their green chile apple fritters or a more traditional variety like raised glaze or Boston cream.
15. Portland, OR
Leave it to Portland to complicate doughnuts in the best way possible. Blue Star Donuts, which has locations in the Sunnyside, Downtown, Boise, and Nob Hill neighborhoods, uses a traditional French brioche dough recipe that takes 18 hours to make. The doughnuts are made from scratch every day, and varieties include chocolate ganache, blueberry bourbon basil, and Cointreau crème brûlée.
16. Denver, CO
With flavors as far-out as the Confused Samoa, a caramel glazed doughnut topped with coconut and chocolate drizzle, Glazed and Confused gives locals what they want — something unique and nontraditional. If you’re looking to plant roots, though, you’d better move quickly. The doughnut shop is located in up-and-coming Washington Virginia Vale, where average sale prices are up over 37% this year.
