Tuesday, October 8, 2013

Donut Pub: Post-Cronut

Next year, the Donut Pub on 14th Street turns 50. It shows no signs of closing and has outlived at least two Dunkin Donuts that have parked nearby in failed attempts to steal the Pub's customers. No dice. The customers here are loyal. The waiter knows their orders and gets them ready before they sit down--black coffee, jelly doughnut, coffee with half and half, decaf, sesame bagel with butter, glass of cold milk.

Now, like many places, they have created their own version of the hysteria-inducing cronut--the "Croissant Donut." But there is no hysteria here. No all-night lines, no sidewalk campers, no groupies. The Pub remains the Pub.



On an unseasonably warm afternoon, the Donut Pub is an oasis of cool and quiet. At the marble counter, a woman stirs her iced coffee, making the milk swirl. It feels like a long sigh.

"Get a load of this," says a man reading the paper. "That neighborhood north of Madison Square Park? Now they're calling it NoMad. Like Soho and Tribeca. Okay, but what the hell is fee-dee? Fee-dee? I can't figure that one out."

Someone complains about the temperature. Someone else says, "Hey, did you know, next year this place'll be 50 years old? Don't the doughnuts taste like they're 50 years old?"

It's a wisecrack. The doughnuts are delicious and fresh. Through the kitchen door, the baker pulls trays out of the oven to cool and gathers chocolate doughnuts into long baskets for display. He threads a dozen Honey Dips onto wooden spindles and douses them with a thick, gooey glaze before leaving them to drip.



The wisecracker is "Magic Mike," a retired member of the FDNY who wanders into the Donut Pub to perform card tricks and to sell decks of magic cards to customers. He demonstrates the Disappearing/Reappearing deck, the Svengali, and Chase the Ace. He says, "Hocus pocus, alakazam," and makes a handkerchief disappear into a fake rubber thumb hidden in his fist. He and the Pub's manager give each other the business.

"Hey Mike, who'd you have to blow to get into that Brotherhood of Magicians? I want to know, why'd they let you in?"

On the radio, The Eagles are taking it to the limit. A man who smells fresh from the barber, of Clubman talcum powder, walks in, sits down, and begins to obsessively arrange the nearby napkin and sugar dispensers, to make them neat, to make sure they're just right. Everything has its proper place. The waiter, without exchanging a word, places a cup of coffee and a toasted coconut doughnut in front of the man. All is right with the world.



Not everyone here is happy, however. Like the blonde who totters in on her stiletto heels to loudly ask, "You have coffee?"

"Regular?" says the waiter, grabbing a cup.

"Just regular? You don't have lattes, cappuccino, espresso?" She squints for several seconds at the coffee pots on their hot plates and then points a lacquer-tipped finger at them. "Is that the regular coffee?"

"That's coffee," the waiter says.

"What does 'regular' mean?"

"Milk and sugar."

"Oh," says the blonde, "no, no." She walks out empty-handed. She doesn't even look at the knock-off cronut. But nobody seems to mind.




Also:
Donut Pub Wins
The Donut Pub
Peter Pan Donut Shop
Donuts Coffee Shop
Disco Donut

29 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ah... no lattes? What fresh hell is this!

Anonymous said...

rscunive 1335I miss a good regular coffee. :(

marjorie said...

lovely little slice of nyc.

did you try the cronut?

Jeremiah Moss said...

nah, I stick with my old standbys: Honey Dip or toasted coconut.

Someone Said said...

I hope this place lives forever.

Anonymous said...

I love donuts and I love The Donut Pub! I also love that the customers gave the old finger to Funkin Donuts and stayed loyal to the Pub. At least there's a small segment of us here in the city that aren't going to sell out to the a-hole foodies, food trucks and chains. If I wasn't so weight conscious I'd be eating breakfast at the Donut Pub everyday!

JAZ said...

"What does 'regular' mean?"

Sorry, but if you are over 7 years old and have to ask that question, then you should just be launched into orbit, never to bother the rest of us again.

laura r. said...

the problem w/this post is that we dont know where this place is. "14th" is a long street, are you keeping it a secret?

Filmatix said...

@JAZ

YES. "To da Moon, Alice!!"

Some days, I have the errant suspicion that Jeremiah is making these people up--and their clueless squawking, complaining, and selfish smartphoning--and then I'll pass someone on the street and overhear them, and realize, "Nope! It's all true."

Really, lady? Even Dunkin Donuts has ads on TV or your iPhone or wherever, and you should know they have coffee. How can you can walk into a place with wall-to-wall donuts and ask that?

I really hope Donut Pub lasts. We always loved Donuts on 23rd/8th Ave [can't even remember their real name, if anyone's got a clue]. D-Donuts is such a poor substitute, you just feel like noone gives a shit, the utter sameness of all of them; and donuts have enough sugar and fat--what up with those 7,000-calorie sweet drinks? Sad that it's the only place in many communities where the outcasts, drunks, and homeless go for solace.

Gojira said...

I love their crullers. I even love the word.

Joey Blau said...

"Like the blonde who totters in on her stiletto heels "

hmmm do tell more.... what was she wearing?

Joey Blau said...

OH.. and I swear that "regular" was once just the color of the coffee and did NOT include sugar.

so regular no sugar IS a normal order. as is regular one sugar. or dark no sugar.

WHEN did "regular" atart including sugar? 1994?

Anonymous said...

Marble glazed crullers are the way to go here....best donut ever....it makes all the fancy donuts in the City (and you know who you are).....too fancy and overpriced. Sometimes you just want a good ol' donut...and regular coffee...black.

Pat said...

She also asked for a flat white, didn't she?

Anonymous said...

"Through the kitchen door, the baker pulls trays out of the oven to cool and gathers chocolate doughnuts into long baskets for display."

Wow, the author just made this shit up?
Donuts are fried, not baked in an oven. Although most people do not seem to realize this.

Jeremiah Moss said...

He pulled them out of an oven. Go look. Maybe it's some kind of big, industrial, oven-like warmer.

John K said...

Happening upon this place a few years back after a long time in NY/NJ was a personal delight for me. I have told friends to patronize them, but several are much fonder of the glitzier, gourmet Doughnut Plant, on 23rd. Oh well. I'll take Donut Pub any day!

Gojira said...

@John K - I have eaten Doughnut Plant baked goods twice, and each time I was sorely disappointed. Even tho I bought them at the Grand Street location (so assume they were at their freshest), to my mind they were too big, too doughy, and had the taste and consistency of chewy cardboard. Bleh.

Anonymous said...

So one cannot go in and get a black coffee here? Since when is coffee served "regular" as default?

Anonymous said...

They wouldn't need an oven like warmer, their donuts are fried fresh on the premises. I'm sure their muffins and possibly other pastries like danishes if they have them are baked in the oven, which is what you might be referring to. The fact is most people seem to incorrectly assume donuts are baked. They are not.

Anonymous said...

May Donut Pub and Flannerys next door live forever!

Anonymous said...

Thank you again, Jeremiah, for another distinctive, evocative entry. I've never been to the Donut Pub, but thanks to your poetry I can see it, smell it, taste it, and rejoice in its continued existence. Bravo!

Jeremiah Moss said...

thank you for the very kind comment. hope you enjoy the Pub!

sinestra said...

I just had the urge to see if they're open RIGHT NOW. Love these "slice of NYC life" stories- keep em coming

laura r. said...

joe blau, since i am one of the seniors on this blog i will answer your inquiry about "regular coffee": "regular"- since i can remember, like from 50yrs ago to present- is coffee w/milk & sugar. that is the standard american way of drinking it. OR you say "black" OR you say "regular, no sugar" got it? so "regular" has included sugar for 1/2 century. in general people would add their own sugar, or the counter person would give you a small packet. (drinking coffee black is kind of european). if theres anyone else here who has a different memory, please speak up. (ps i find it humorous & depressing that 1994 is some kind of vintage year. maybe thats when they invented frozen yogart or something).

Anonymous said...

They do have an espresso, the 'caffeinator', coffee with a shot of espresso.

Anonymous said...

It's "regular" as in not decaf.

ajax said...

I love the story about the blonde. Great stuff

Anonymous said...

Aint nothing wrong with wanting an espresso!

Small long macchiato, topped up with one sugar FTW!