VanFoodies.com

After we confirmed our trip to Oregon, the first thing I did was to ask fellow bloggers for dining recommendations in Oregon. A number of you guys got back to me, each offering a different list of restaurants. However, one particular place showed up on every list – Voodoo Doughnut.

Voodoo Doughnut, Portland

As soon as I started writing this post I knew I’m going to have some problem typing “doughnut” instead of “donut”. The funny thing is, according to the Oxford Dictionary, “donut” is American spelling. Be prepared to see “doughnut” and “donut” being used interchangeably here.

Line up!

So it was 10:30pm on a Friday, and when this is usually the time for most part of Vancouver (except for the Granville district, or Gastown) to turn into a ghost town, Portland Old Town was bustling. Bars were busy, food trucks were still taking orders, lots of people on the street. In fact, there was a 30-people line up outside of this Voodoo Doughnut location. We chatted with a couple of locals, and they said this was nothing, that usually the line up would be way longer. And apparently we missed an exciting mayoral donut-eating contest. Did I mention that Voodoo Doughnut opens 24-7? I suppose there is a super huge demand for donuts, in particular Voodoo Doughnut, in Portland.

Long lineup for donuts!

Food

Menu board – lots to choose from

There are just way too many donuts to choose from. They need to use not one, but two display cases to show them all. And a gigantic blackboard to list them out. All donuts are hand-made, thus each donut would have its unique icing/glaze/decorations.

One of the display cases

Because we had another 2-hour drive south to Lincoln City, we ordered our donuts to-go.

Voodoo Doughnut to go

Here is what we ordered:

• Tex-ass (Giant donut that equals 6 regular donuts in size. Apparently it’s free if you can eat this doughnut in 80 seconds or less.)
• Voodoo Doll (Raised yeast donut filled with raspberry jelly topped with chocolate frosting and a pretzel stake)
• Portland Cream (Raised yeast donut filled with Bavarian cream with chocolate and two “eyeballs” on top)

Tex-ass, Voodoo Doll, Portland Cream

• The Loop (Raised yeast donut with vanilla frosting and Fruit Loops)
• Mango Tango (Raised yeast donut filled with mango jelly and topped with vanilla frosting and Tang)
• Lemon Chiffon Crueller (French crueller with vanilla frosting, lemon dust and three marshmallows)
• Bacon Maple Bar (Raised yeast donut with maple frosting and crispy bacon on top)
• Old Dirty Bastard (Raised yeast donut with chocolate frosting, Oreos and peanut butter)

The Loop, Mango Tango, Lemon Chiffon Crueller, Bacon Maple Bar, Old Dirty Bastard

I have to confess that we didn’t eat all the donuts the same day. In fact, we left the majority for breakfast the next morning, and shared the donuts with my friends CC and DF. And after that we still had 1 donut left. It was 3 meals worth of donuts and only cost us around US$18. And day-old Voodoo donuts were still pretty good. We really enjoyed all of them, especially with a cup of coffee.

Frankly we liked them all, but if we had to choose some favourites, then our favourite one was definitely the Bacon Maple Bar. The maple+bacon combination is not new, but the maple glaze and the crispy bacon strips on this donut were just the perfect amount of sweetness and saltiness – would go back just to get this again. Another one that I liked was the Old Dirty Bastard – you can’t go wrong with the chocolate+peanut butter combo and there’s just so much topping – it’s even better when it’s slightly melting so the peanut butter would drip all over your hands!

Tackling the Tex-ass

Tex-ass is just a regular glazed donut, it’s just gigantic. But trust me, it’s a very good glazed donut. We were lucky because we got one from a fresh batch so it’s still warm. It was light and airy, yet cakey. That, I would go back for more. The Voodoo Doll is basically a raspberry jelly-filled donut – it’s interesting mostly because of the hand-crafted decorations and the uniqueness in each voodoo doll. A bit gimmicky I’d say.

Putting a stake in the voodoo doll

Final Thoughts

In case you haven’t noticed, this is the donut place on the Food Network TV show World’s Weirdest Restaurants. Overall, we love the donuts at Voodoo Doughnut, and they are very reasonably-priced. Since we came back, we have been telling everyone about this place and recommend all of them to go there if they’re in Portland. Mr. has been scheming his return to Portland. I hope I won’t have to wait long for some more awesome Voodoo donuts.

I really was there!

Voodoo Doughnut
22 SW 3rd Avenue, Portland
503-241-4704
voodoodoughnut.com