Rating:
Pros
- Big Donuts
- Big Flavor
Cons
- None
Dear Reader,
I’d like to formally apologize to you. Since I was too busy stuffing my fat face with these donuts, I put little thought into taking my usual amount of pictures. Hopefully, my hyperbole will carry you into a sugar high in spirit, as you rightfully deserve.
Now, onto the show!
The Simpsons and Iron Man 2 don’t have much in common but they do share one glazed beacon of American truth. Somewhere in the USA is a donut shop with a donut prop on it so large that if rolled off, it’s taking someone — or potentially a lot of someones — with it. To my surprise, when I moved to Los Angeles I found out the donuts shop from both the silver and small screen exists. And its name — Randy’s Donuts.
The Fall of the Krispy Kreme Empire
I remember when the Krispy Kreme boom happened in the 2000s. Starbucks and Krispy Kreme battled for real estate like Mortal Kombat characters. Some extremely close to each other. I can imagine Chief Wiggums and other fictionally stereotypical cops like him were having an existential crisis, deciding which door to enter first. Although it should be an obvious choice — Krispy Kreme when the ‘fresh’ light is on (if you know, you know). But then, Krispy Kreme just vanished like a dream. At least they did on the East Coast. The only way those of us unlucky enough to not live near a Krispy Kreme could grab them was through select supermarkets. Still good, but not the same. I tell you all of this to understand that I have seen Heaven in my lifetime and have had it snatched away. Yeah, Dunkin Donuts was around but, again, not the same.
So when I found out that Randy’s Donuts was no myth and easy to travel to, I planned a day to sample some Randy’s right after visiting the famous Pink’s Hot Dogs, which I also will review in its hot-doggy goodness soon.
In preparation for a likely inevitable food coma, I hit the gym, then I hit Pink’s. Much to my chagrin, I had realized too late that there are multiple Randy’s locations. As the one from the movies I wanted to see was in Inglewood, I needed to choose another location. Since I was Valley-bound, I settled on the closest location on my journey.
Onward to Burbank!
I was truly terrified. Not of the suburbs, although soccer moms in packs are unpredictable. I was terrified that I made the wrong choice. In my shortsightedness and childish naivete, I feared that because it wasn’t the ‘movie’ one that it was going to suck. I know it’s not rational, but you only get one first impression.
This Randy’s location I pulled into happens to be next to a brand, spanking new (and empty) business park. Happy that I picked a Saturday to do this, I popped out of my car to smell two things — the sunny air and the unmistakable smell of donuts. However, this donut smell didn’t have that heavy air to it, if that makes sense. Though sometimes we forget, donuts are deep fried and usually that fried air comes across in the bakery. But first, there was no ‘heavy air’ and second, I hadn’t even reached the door yet.
I knew something was different when I stepped in to see the variety. I won’t try to explain some of the Dave-Chappelle-Half-Baked-inspired flavors I saw, but I can tell you I picked out the ones that screamed out for me to eat them. I got a half-dozen, not because I wanted six donuts, but primarily because of the way the menu confused me in the moment. Quick side story; The menu was fine. However, as I checked the prices and readied myself to buy a plain donut and roll out, the very sweet girl spoke to me. It happens seldomly, but I had a brain fart and hurt myself in the confusion (Pokemon reference). So I thought it was required for me to order by the half-dozen. The End. Onto the main event!
Randy’s Should Come with an Addiction Disclaimer
Before I take you through this experience, here is what I ordered.
Here’s the picture again for reference, starting at the top left:
- Strawberry Sprinkles (or Jimmies as they are truly called)
- Regular Glazed
- Chocolate Cake Frosting with M&M’s
- Square Cronut
- Cereal Milk Frosting with Fruit Loops
- Matcha Green Tea
I’m going gloves off now… Respectfully, Krispy Kreme can suck it! Ok, too much. I still lust Krispy Kreme, but these donuts are the best donut chain I’ve had by a long shot in California. Donut get me wrong (I’ve waited so long to use that pun), I’ve been to California Donuts and they’re good donuts. I had some insanely good donuts from boutique donut shops but considering these are from a chain, these hit different.
First, I’ll share what they all have in common. They are big! For reference, that box spans my car seat almost from end to end. Next, they are taller than normal donuts — About an inch and a half in height. Also, all the icings were thicker than expected. Finally, they are light. Meaning they are fluffier than most donuts I’ve had and don’t sit in your gut like a rock. However, they are not light in flavor.
Five of my six choices all had a similar base donut, so I’ll focus on the icings. What I will say about the base donut is it tasted almost like Krispy Kreme improved their recipe or used the freshest ingredients. The Strawberry donut’s icing was thicker, like a candied shell, and had more strawberry extract intensity than I am used to, however it was all to its benefit. The Sprinkles were good and fresh but what I expected. The glaze on the plain donut was thicker as well with more vanilla than your standard glaze. The Chocolate frosted was straight-up cake frosting but bordering again into shell territory. The Cereal Milk donut frosting tasted exactly like cereal milk, but the consistency was like Oreo cookie filling and the Fruit Loops were out-of-the-box crunchy. The Matcha donut is incredible, but it’s a hard-to-explain, unique flavor unless you’ve had the Japanese snack Pocky in said Green Tea flavor. The last but not least donut was the square cronut. It was crispy all the way through and glazed within an inch of its life. I couldn’t say a bad thing about any of them if I tried.
In hindsight, I may be ruined by these donuts — and cronuts — for life. I inhaled most of them in the car ride home and tried to save the rest for later, but failed miserably. I would have given Randy’s over four stars, but I reserve that rating for life-changing food experiences. But for a second, I honestly considered it. When you get a donut craving and if you want to see if Randy’s Donuts lives up to the Hollywood hype, do yourself a favor and go to the closest one you can. I’m glad I did.
Randy’s Donuts Burbank
3007 N Hollywood Way
Burbank, CA 91505
