Donut Plant – 6th Time Is a Charm
Historically, I’ve been a huge hater of Donut Plant. I kept trying it and every time I came away feeling that it was overhyped garbage and that people just kept listening to media outlets telling them it was amazing because it was different and then feeling like they had to say it was awesome. I dislike when restaurants either live off a reputation built a long time ago (Veniero’s, 2nd Ave Deli etc) or are all hype, but are not very good and live off media hype. That is how I felt about Donut Plant for a very long time.
Someone on chowhound said that I really needed to try the tres leches donut and it would change my mind. So a month or so ago, I decided to go for the 6th time to try this donut (I’ve literally been there 5 times previously; I love donuts so I was really trying to like this place), fully expecting to be disappointed again. Luckily, that donut changed my views on Donut Plant and I’ll admit that I was wrong on Donut Plant.
Tres Leches:
This is a take on tres leches cake, tres leches in Spanish literally means “three milk” and is a cake that is soaked in evaporated milk, condensed milk and heavy cream. The donut here is a cake donut that has a white frosting on it and has pockets of what I believe is condensed milk in it. The result is amazing, the cake is good, but the pockets of condensed milk really make it amazing. It’s sort of hard to explain and I’m sure it sounds like some overly sweet mess from the way I’m describing it (I don’t like really sweet stuff generally), but you really have to try it to understand why it’s so good. By the way get some milk with it, goes so well. 8.75/10
Pumpkin:
I believe this was a seasonal special, it was another cake donut that with a light brown / orange frosting that had bits of nuts sprinkled on it. It was okay, the flavor was sort of pumpkin spicy-y type of flavor, but neither me or my gf were particularly enthralled with it. 7/10
Crème Brulee:
This looked interesting, so I decided to try one. It was a really small donut that has carmelized sugar on top (similar to actual crème brulee) and then a custard inside (again similar to actual crème brulee). It was really good and the contrast between the slightly bitter carmelized sugar on top and the sweet creamy custard in the inside was great. 8.25/10
While I still dislike most of their donuts, the 6th time was a charm for me. Now I like Donut Plant and have been coming here pretty regularly. I’d recommend coming here for the tres leches and crème brulee donuts, they are very good.
Address:
379 Grand St
New York, NY 10002
(212) 505-3700