As a little kid and still today the hole of a donut is my favorite part.

How can a hole be real? The hand made circle of dough that gets collected from the center of home made Donuts. The kind I remember my mom creating to be ready and waiting for us to try after a hard day of the three “R”‘s. As my three older brothers and I climbed off bus 13 and walked from the end of long, maple lined driveway growing up on a Maine farm. Into the kitchen hit first by the smell of fresh baking donuts.

Those donut holes and large round rings them came from parked on a wooden cutting board. Hoisted high as fresh shaped donut dough to tilt, slide, swim and sizzle into the boiling grease. Fried food using natural ingredients made with love by your mom. Fresh, hot, and some rolled in sugar when they hop out of the fryolator hot tub bath. To park in rows on the wire rack to cool as the sweet coating different than glaze bonds. Sugar dusted chocolate donut holes are my personal favorite. Not all the jazzed up cake type drizzled and too busy to just enjoy the solo of whatever flavor you get treated to at the moment.

And wait a minute … is it doughnut or donut? The difference for what you call the round circle of food everyone likes to nibble.

Maine has some unique landmark donut makers and they don’t all peddle them under a franchise brand mega watt neon lighted sign.

Nothing goes better with your fresh morning coffee, fresh squeezed juice, whatever you use to wash it down than a brand new young donut to munch on while you plan your day. The time when you converse with your mate, your collegues, whoever about whatever is on today’s agenda plan of attack. Or to sample when you catch up on local grapevine news not covered by or of much interest to the wire services. When picking up a white bakery bag of fresh made goodies at the well known eatery in your small Maine community.

Franchise donuts from Dunkin’ and Timmy Ho Ho Horten’s are fine and dandy. Sorry, in Maine the world does not run on Tim or Dunkin’. Who wants donuts and which kind? The hands shoot skyward. Local if you have them please. Home made not the kind machined in rows and rows like soldiers marching to battle. Drive window quick for on the go is great when traveling outside Maine but the here you go Nascar squeal and peel out and easy has its place. But the one of a kind local experience getting a donut, the kind about as close as you can to say your mom or grandmother’s takes it to a whole new level. These donuts or doughnuts are not even in the same league ball park. The recall of an earlier pleasant childhood memory moment is triggered when you can replicate the event right? Especially when you consider the hands that rolled the dough and cut the donuts one by one are not longer on Earth to perform the loving task. Hand made beats machined precise.

The Holy Donut in the Portland area has a unique story. Lifting from their our story page, it is no wonder the four at a time donut making in a home kitchen by a daughter with help from her Dad exploded into the eighty employees, three locations, over two million served delicacies in just three short years. The power of a simple donut bought in the dinner bucket design box with the handles and four color design.

Using mashed Maine potatoes to weave into the recipe mix, colors from natural ingredients not red die number three or blue dye number 40. That’s part of the magic that makes the local donut roll stronger longer than the mass produced all the same kind.

Wells Beach Maine has Congdon’s Donuts that locals and tourists alike share the same daily addiction.

It’s not just seafood, whoppie and blueberry pies that gets the rave reviews. And it is not only the donut itself that causes the excitement. The local enterprise that creates and sells the donut and other pastry and baked items is part of the experience.

Dealing with a local business that usually is one of a kind unique to one area of Maine gives you a good feeling. When you ask for a dozen and with a smile, with the local chatter in the background from diners drifting in and out, from workers joking around that you get to know more intimately the more trips you walk through the door.

It is satisfying to shop local and know the home made this morning item was not loaded with preservatives, not wrapped in cellophane and mass produced many days or weeks or eve months ago. And the local donut served up with a smile from the donut shop owner or a member of their family that made them from scratch. That really loves their job, the people and the chance to serve you.

Locally to where I hunt and peck, Sadie’s Bakery has been creating donuts along with other baked goods since 1948.

The longevity helps create the mystic, the generation crossing habit of enjoying a locally made small pleasure like a fresh donut or two. Life’s greatest pleasures are the small joys that everyone can enjoy and the communion of meeting at a local eatery to help yourself to a coffee and whatever the flavor of the day offered this morning is satisfying. Or to pick up a bag or box for others to enjoy that had no idea the were coming their way. Watch a video of one owner of Sadie’s Bakery to see Tim, Sharon and a grandfather getting up day after day because it is time to make the donuts. Check out the old Maine potato barrel filled with flour and hear about what one flavor made the day for so many in the oldest town in Aroostook County.

Canadian donuts also roll in from neighboring New Brunswick Canada in the Maritimes under the brand Mrs. Dunsters. And in the Old Town Maine area, Labree’s Donuts. Like Sadies Bakery, 1948 was the same year Labree’s Donuts starting showing up at snack time. What local donut does it best to fit your pie hole? What do you reach for when the need is for a donut or doughnut in Maine?

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | [email protected] |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA