Adventures in Doughnutland.
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Writing and Photographs by Aki Kamozawa & H. Alexander Talbot
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Nothing is Original
I love this quote. I am thankful to have come across it years ago. I believe I have posted it before, but as I am just getting my fingers warmed up and my brain functioning again it is a wonderful happy place to begin.
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Caramelized Cream Croissants
Cooking with cream is currently my thing. It's been this way for a number of years. I could probably write a book on the idea. I certainly have a few chapters created by now. But, the act of writing a book often finalizes an idea. I am currently enjoying the ongoing flow of thoughts on the simple idea.
If you look back at our grated croissants, you'll see we coated the croissants with a slurry of cream and sugar and then roasted them in the oven. I reapplied that idea to slices of our croissant loaves. I brushed the slices with our cream slurry and cooked the croissant slices in a non-stick pan, flipping occasionally to evenly cook the cream and allow the sugar to caramelize on the bread. (We used to do something similar with butter and sugar. The use of cream instead slows down the process and adds steam. The steam warms the croissant slices throughout and makes them warm and buttery.)
When the croissant slices are caramelized we transfer them to cooling racks to allow the sugar to harden into a thin glassy sheen. The caramelized croissant slices are delightful while still warm and still delicious when cooled down.
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Grated Croissants
I wanted to be frugal and not waste unsold croissant bread.
We started with caramelizing croissant croutons. We cut our croissant loaf into cubes and coated the pieces in a slurry of sugar and heavy cream. We put cream and sugar coated croutons onto a sheet pan and cooked them for about an hour until the croissants and sugar caramelized and formed an almost toffee exterior.
We cooled the croutons down and snacked on them. They were delicious. But in their crouton form they were only a dangerous snack. I looked at the croutons and saw an opportunity to turn them into crumbs for topping our doughnuts. We put them into a food processor and pulverized them into a coarse crumb. We used these on top of our Dough-knots, a new shape of doughnut using our meltaway dough. (Our meltaway dough is laminated in the style of a croissant, so the connection made sense.) The dough-knots with caramelized croissant crumbs were delicious and fun to create, sell and indulge in.
After looking at the crumbs in action I had a further idea. I wanted to grate the croissants onto our croissants. We took the croissant crumbs and pureed them with Blond Orelys Chocolate and brown butter. We set the mixture into pint containers and refrigerated it. We baked off our croissants and when they were cool we used a micro-plane to grate the croissant mixture onto the croissant. The end result was a buttery, rich, caramelized nest of delicious topping our crispy, flaky and buttery croissants.
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Mayo Marinated Five Ingredient Fried Chicken, Plus Vegetables
Okay, so fried chicken is a thing that lots of us have played with over the years. Recently, I saw our friend, Kenji, post about updating his 5 ingredient fried chicken recipe, swapping pickled jalapenos for his pickles in the recipe. He was smitten with his swap. I can agree with the move, as we did our pretzel crusted fried chicken with cherry pepper caramel sauce for years. The spice is nice.
I love the idea of simple, but, as anyone who knows me knows, I will make simple hard. My one hang-up with the 5 ingredient fried chicken sandwich is the lack of mayonnaise on the bun. Then it dawned on me. We could create a brine blending mayonnaise and cherry pepper brine. (We made a second version using giardanera, for those who aren't feeling the spice.) We scored our chicken and put it in a zip top bag with the mayo brine and refrigerated it overnight. The following morning we dredged the thighs, dripping in thick brine, in self rising flour seasoned with salt. We refrigerated the coated chicken on a parchment lined sheet pan for 6-ish hours (you could also leave it overnight and prep a day ahead) and then fried it at 375°F for 2 minutes and 30 seconds. We seasoned the fried chicken with salt.
While I fried the chicken, Aki chopped up cherry peppers and giardanera and added them to two separate containers of heavy mayonnaise to make tangy condiments for the buns. This way we could match the mayo to the brined chicken thighs.
We toasted our buns, in this case they were brioche-esque, and smeared the appropriate mayo onto the buns. Then we added sliced tomatoes and romaine leaves along with the chicken. We could have just put the chicken on the bun with the mayo to stay true to the 5 ingredients. But why stop there? We wanted to explore and enjoy. The 5 ingredient mayo model is magnificent. The final addition of fresh vegetables, a slaw or something else bright is a no-brainer in our kitchen.
You could definitely taste the difference between the two brines. The chicken had a great tangy flavor with a hint of spice. The crust was tender and crispy, while the meat was juicy and flavorful. And if you were wondering, a kimchi-mayo version is next on the list.
One more idea to explore and expand upon, what flavor is your mayo? There is such a variety of delicious condiments on grocery shelves these days, both spicy and smoked, that it's easy to add yet another layer of flavor without increasing the size of your ingredient list.
Ingredient Guidelines:
Brine:
100 grams mayonnaise
100 grams cherry pepper (GIardinara, kimchi, pickle, etc.) brine
6 boneless and skinless chicken thighs scored
Self Rising flour seasoned with 1% salt
Chopped Cherry Peppers (or whatever pickled vegetable was in the brine)
Mayonnaise
Toasted Buns
*sliced and salted tomatoes
*lettuce leaves
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Down the Rabbit Hole
Roughly 7 years ago Curiosity Doughnuts began with a question, "What can we do with doughnuts?" The answer is still being written. Curiosity Doughnuts gets its name from our own restless curiosity. We are always thinking about new flavors and textures, bouncing around different ideas, and rotating our offerings, because we’re never satisfied with the status quo.
Curiosity Doughnuts began as a part time passion project in the Stockton Market that grew into a full time business with shops inside Whole Foods Market and beyond. We were moving from NH back to PA and we wanted to try something new. The idea of doughnuts came up, then a space magically appeared, and the rest is history. Our history began with Alex making a ridiculous 14 hour round trip commute each week for seven months while we sold our house and made the actual move and a whole lot of skepticism from everyone we knew. We’ve built a flourishing small business that makes people happy. Our goal is always to make people happy with doughnuts. We strive to do that every day we are open.
Our customers are the most important ingredients in our success. They are smart and inquisitive. They talk to us, asking questions, and sharing thoughts. We appreciate every one of you. It’s been such a pleasure to share our doughnuts with the world.
We have the best staff ever. We couldn’t have developed, shared, and eaten so many delicious doughnuts without them. Whole Foods Market has been a solid base of operations. They gave us the opportunity to share their space and we have met many incredible people throughout our relationship with them.
Curiosity Doughnuts has come to a crossroads and we are choosing to go off-road. The last seven years have been incredibly delicious, creative and inspiring. They have also taken their toll. We are hitting pause and shutting down our current locations. Our last day at Native Café will be Saturday, June 25. Princeton will be Sunday, June 26. White Horse Coffee will be July 1. Our final day will be at Spring House on Sunday July 3.
Change is necessary and we are embracing that. We are brainstorming new ways to bring the doughnuts back, but it’s a work in progress. Any new developments will be posted here and on social media. So keep an eye out. You never know where the rabbit hole will lead us…
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Curiosity Doughnuts: Six Years and
We opened Curiosity Doughnuts six years ago this weekend. I look back at what we were doing and how we did it. It was difficult and exhilarating. It was unknown. Six years later and our days still feel the same. Except now we have a few more doughs under our belts and have developed a unique style. Not knowing and being constantly curious has allowed us to discover, create and evolve. Thanks you to our incredible staff and passionate customers for keeping us moving forward.
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Cornflakes Crullers
I loved this idea. Our first attempts proved to be an epic fail. That said, I may have to revisit this again soon.
Years Past
April 29, 2007
April 29, 2005
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Box of Churros
These seem to be destined to top a doughnut.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Protect Your Timer
Covering the timer with a thin layer of plastic wrap keeps all the gunk out of the buttons and makes daily cleaning, especially in a doughnut shop, extremely easy.
Years Past
April 23, 2019
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Chocolate Lemon Twists
I have always enjoyed the twist, particularly in ice cream. At the doughnut shop we currently do not have the capacity to serve ice cream. We do have the ability and the resources to create and combine flavors. When we first opened we created the marble doughnut. Almost five years later we have begun exploring twists, combing the flavors of our new fashioned doughnuts. My current go to is the crushworthy combination of chocolate and lemon in a twist.
Years Past
April 21, 2019
April 21, 2009
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Panettone-Nut
We have taken the idea of the rich, decadent and inclusion riddled panettone and applied it to a doughnut.
Years Past
April 6, 2006
April 6, 2005
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Laminated Brioche Doughnut
I have been intrigued by laminated brioche for awhile. Intrigue and action do not always correspond. I finally took the time to tinker with our vanilla yeasted doughnut and add lamination to the process. The result, thankfully, was worth the wait. Our vanilla yeasted doughnut dough is extremely soft. Because it is I used room temperature butter to laminate the dough. The finished doughnut is lighter but richer and almost custardy in texture. It eats as if our cruller and our doughnut had kids. Now comes the fun part of getting better at the process and adding it to the line up at Curiosity Doughnuts.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Not Good Enough
It is difficult to put in time and effort only to get back less than great results. I have spent several weeks tinkering with fried dough, specifically our dough knot. Unfortunately for me my efforts have not resulted in a moment of amazement. The tied and fried dough was good. But it did not change me. The tinkering process felt like pushing on a wall to open a door. I just couldn't make it happen.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Fried Dough Knots
We have been working on the idea of state fair fried dough and funnel cakes. The process has all tied up. Hopefully soon we will have it ready at Curiosity Doughnuts.
Years Past
February 25, 2010
February 25, 2007
February 25, 2005
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Powdered Pinwheel
I have been working on a new dough for Curiosity Doughnuts. It is light, flaky and delicate. I spent an excessive amount of time trying to wrap the dough around a filling. That time was filled with ongoing failures. It turned out the dough preferred to be on its own. When we fried it as beautiful pinwheel it was inanely delicious. Now we need to dial in the production.
Years Past
February 18, 2005
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Blueberry Maple Oatmeal
The chill in the air sparked my desire for oatmeal. I cooked a pot of rolled oats and topped them with heavy cream, maple syrup and blueberries. The combination was classic pancake style. It struck a chord of happy memories. It was warm gruel that I was able to become lost in thought while eating. Now it is time to turn it into a doughnut.
Years Past
February 17, 2005
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Boston Spheres
We freeze our Boston cream custard in sphere molds. We dip the frozen spheres in our doughnut magic shell and roll them in white chocolate pretzel crumbs. We thaw the spheres in the refrigerator. The shell forms on the outside and the inside is creamy decadent custard.
Years Past
February 8, 2005
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Sfogliatella
Actually, what I made is closer to a lobster tail. Rather than filling the layered dough with a ricotta custard or a pate choux I opted for a quick biscuit. The layers of dough provide a crisp exterior and the biscuit is moist and tender inside. I baked our first version to see how the components came together. It gave me a general idea on the processes needed to create the pastry. It also alleviated my impatience. I have a base to tinker with as we transform the classic pastry into a doughnut.
Years Past
February 3, 2005
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Drying on Racks
Brandon, the chef of Curiosity Doughnuts in Tyson's Corner VA, made a small adjustment in drying doughnut biscotti. He put them on racks. The small step shortened the drying time and made the overall drying more consistent. A brilliant adjustment.
Years Past
January 21, 2005
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Doughnut Biscotti
I love looking for delicious outlets for doughnuts. This week I have been tinkering with biscotti and using them as a vehicle for unsold doughnuts. The biscotti incorporates the doughnuts and captures their flavor. And they go great with a cup of coffee.
Years Past
January 16, 2005
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Pop Up Doughnut
I'd love to find a way to integrate this card and its style into doughnutland.
Years Past
January 11, 2011
January 11, 2005
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Passion Fruit Doughnuts
After making of the blueberry doughnuts we put my passion fruit plan into action. We used the same model as our blueberry dough. The doughnuts were intensely flavored and aromatic. The passion fruit, a secondary thought to the blueberry, was the real winner. We topped our first run with strawberry crumbs.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Blueberry Lemon Twists
It is great fun creating new doughnuts. It is even more combining them.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Feeling Blue
Blueberry doughnuts have been on our to do list for about a year. We finally put it to the top of our list and have it ready to debut this weekend.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Peppermint Sticks
Christmas equals candy candy canes. Okay, not really, but its arrival coincides with the excess abundance and acceptance and the candy-cane-ification of everything. It hands out our free pass to make our candy cane crumbs and integrate them into Doughnutland. This year we topped our chocolate glazed sourdough bars with the the candy cane crumbs.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Dump Your Dough Hook
We have found that the paddle attachment rather than the dough hook mixes and kneads dough more efficiently and more consistently. That is all.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Re...
Re-starting
Re-imagining
Re-purposing
Re-mixing
Re-inventing
Re-mastering
None of this is useful if we have not first started, imagined, mixed, purposed, invented and mastered.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Doughnut Crumb Streusel 2019
We are revisiting doughnut crumb streusel at Curiosity Doughnuts. We have made a few versions of it over the years. It is built on the model of our cake crumb streusel from Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook. The streusel combines cake crumbs, in our case doughnut crumbs, with a base streusel formula. We chill the streusel down and then bake it until it is toasty and crunchy. Then, we pulverize the streusel into a fine crumb for topping doughnuts. We have let this topping fall out of fashion. Thankfully I am always happy to dig into our archives in search of ideas that need to be revisited.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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The Home-tel
I came down to the Tyson's Corner area of Virginia on October 20th. I had plans to stay in an AirBnb. That was an epic failure. I had to shift quickly and ended up in a Comfort Inn for a few nights. I returned home in despair as we planned the next stage of opening Curiosity Doughnuts in Virginia and examined my lodging opportunities. I came across the Hyatt House out by Dulles airport. It was reasonably priced, actually the best out there, and it had space as well as semi-homelike conveniences: a full sized fridge, a 2 burner stove, a toaster and a microwave.
I have been in the Hyatt House for over a month now. I am the guy the front desk people now wave to and I know them by name. The other evening as I arrived back (home) I was greeted with welcome back to your home-tel. The comment was funny because it was true.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Opening Curiosity Doughnuts, Pardon the Interuption, Day 11 (Enjoy the Archives)
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Limiting Waste
I derive great pleasure in the results of our product utilization at Curiosity Doughnuts. After rolling and shaping all of our 11 doughs and 10 varietals we end up with a piece of trim the size of a golf ball. It is the only dough that we end up throwing away. Today it dawned on me. We can and should fry that piece of dough and use it in our doughnut bread pudding or our doughnut crumbs.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Curiosity Doughnuts 3.0
From Stockton, NJ to Spring House, PA and, now, a second location in Tyson's Corner, VA. We're spreading the doughnut love to the very best of our ability.
Years Past
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Cookies are Edible Sunshine
As we prepare to open our new shop it occurred to me that in order to do better I must be better. I am not the easiest to deal with, because I am straightforward and wear my emotions on my sleeve, all of them. At the new space we whipped up a batch of Aki's chocolate chip cookies in order to deliver the warm cookie experience. We gave away the warm chocolate chip cookies to say thank you to those around us for being kind, helpful, and extremely patient.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Potato Rolls v-Too Many To Count
I have finally come back to our potato rolls. This version I increased the heavy cream in the recipe and reduced the buttermilk. I pulled out some of the potato flakes and increased the salt. I brushed the exterior with whole milk. These adjustments created the potato roll I have been chasing. It has structure but is tender. It has a fine crumb and creamy texture. The roll is potato perfection. For now.
Years Past
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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Learning to Roar
Adding a second shop is teaching us a lot about what we don't know. It's hard to toot your own horn and to reach out to people and ask for help. This new project has forced us to do both of those things, sometimes at the same time. It's helped us to own our accomplishments in a way that we may have shied away from in the past. We've never been big on bragging about our achievements but we've realized that acknowledging them can be empowering. It reminds us that even when things get tough we can push through and make things happen. We know that we can create magic because we've done it before. This is very helpful knowledge when we're chasing doughnut unicorns in Virginia and beyond...
Years Past
October 4, 2008
Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work
Maximum Flavor: Recipes That Will Change the Way You Cook
Gluten Free Flour Power: Bringing Your Favorite Foods Back to the Table
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