Sunday, August 28, 2005

Worth the Price of Admission - Those Little Donuts at the PNE


Mini Donut Close-up Posted by Picasa

Oooo, just look at those beautiful little blobs! "Those Little Donuts" (formerly Tom Thumb Mini Donuts) at the PNE every year are by far my favourite doughnuts ever (second place is taken by Bin 942's hot little doughnuts they make to order that comes with their chocolate fondue. Third place is hot Krispy Kremes straight off the conveyer belt. Incidentally, don't even bother with KK's if they're cold. Wait for the "Hot Now" sign to light up). Nothing comes close to Those Little Donuts though, not even those various other mini-doughnut stands, such as the Playland stand, and the mini doughnut stand that's found at the Celebration of Light fireworks festival. The taste and texture of the originals are just perfect. What makes them all the more desirable is the fact that I can only get those donuts for a fleeting 2 weeks at the end of August/early September during the Pacific National Exhibition fair. And I tend to only visit once each year. So here is a food item that is, for me, the very top of its class, and yet I only have access to it once a year. A fleeting 15 minutes of pleasure (or less) each year! It's come down to me paying to get into the PNE just so that I can have those doughnuts. I even dragged my friend to the PNE with me this year so that I could get at those doughnuts. So really, to me, those doughnuts are worth the price of two admissions, plus the five bucks for the two bags of doughnuts themselves. In essence, this year, I paid $25 for a small bag of doughnuts that I inhaled in a matter of minutes - you're kind of forced to eat them quickly, otherwise they get cold. And okay, yes, I did other stuff at the PNE too, but if I'm really up front about it, it's all about the doughnuts.


PNE Mini Donuts - moving through the frying machine Posted by Picasa

Part of what I love about the doughnuts is the cute little frying machines where the dough plops out of the squirty part, and then the little guys happily swim and bob, going around and around in a swirl in the oil, slowly turning perfectly golden brown. Then they get their little coating of cinnamon sugar. Cute food, cooking in a cute food maker! I'm so enraptured, I'm driven to bad haiku:

Little donut swim,
Spiral, sizzle, bob to me
I'm waiting for you

Heh, I hope I haven't frightened my readership away. I'll stay away from the poetry, I promise!

5 comments:

Unknown said...

I thought I was alone in my insanity. Every year, Rob and I go to the PNE to eat those doughnuts. And a few other things.... I don't even do rides!

Dumpling-girl said...

LOL! Great minds... Okay, a couple of years ago, I think I did mini doughnuts, candy apple, cotton candy, corn on the cob (I love that they just dip it right into the vat of melted butter), AND a corn dog. Others got cube fries (which seem to have disappeared now), and foot-long hot dog. I shouldn't be proud of this, huh? I shared it all with someone else, but I still got sick. The corn dog pushed me over the edge. This year, despite my friend's discouragement, I had another corn dog, and it was great. I also tried one of those Fair Scones with jam and whipped butter, the ones that people are always writing about being a bit tradition of the fair, and it was pretty good. The jam was nice and chunky, and it was all warm and gooey (for a scone). I also tried the garlic prawns on a skewer at the corn on the cob stand and that was tasty too.

LotusRapper said...

Doughnut haiku .... LOL !

Haven't had those since my last time at the PNE (early 90s). But food is definitely a good reason alone to go to PNE. As is the Chinese Night Market.

Dumpling-girl said...

Thanks for commenting, Ken. I'm planning my first visit to the Richmond night market soon!

LotusRapper said...

Go with an empty stomach (but with some Rolaids pills) and lots of loonies and toonies, it makes the impulse buying and eating so much easier.