K is for ...

KRISPY KREME

One late December evening as I was leaving a Christmas event at the North Carolina Executive Mansion, as I stepped out the main front doors and on to one of the outside patios, I was greeted with a very familiar smell in the air. I paused on the top step and thought to myself certainly you cannot smell that from here. I turned to look back inside the Executive Mansion and did not see any snacks being passed out that evening, and then it hit me -- I needed to run for Governor of the great state of North Carolina so that I can spend my evenings on the back patio inhaling the fragrant aroma of Krispy Kreme Doughnuts!!! What a lovely and distinct smell it was, and I was absolutely amazed that you could literally smell the fresh doughnuts being made at that distance. It isn’t that far of a drive (or walk) from the Executive Mansion to the main Krispy Kreme location in Raleigh, but it was further than I anticipated the smell of the hot doughnuts’ scent to be travelling. Who knows, maybe I am part bloodhound and can sniff those suckers from a mile away! Either way, it amazed me and made the night even more riveting.

Yes, folks, I am an addict. I am a doughnut addict, but not just any particular doughnut I am a Krispy Kreme addict. AND I am proud of it (though, I am currently going through severe withdrawals because of my diet that is limiting me from my excursions downtown to buy a few or a dozen or more!) If you don’t like Krispy Kreme, well, I will seriously have to pray for you because they are absolutely melt-in-your mouth delicious!

As a young girl, I was always pretty good with directions. I could easily tell you how to get to so-and-so’s house or to such-and-such store, and I absolutely knew how to get to the Krispy Kreme! However, I never really comprehended how close the main Krispy Kreme location was to my house. Maybe that is because our family had a special tradition that we only really ever bought Krispy Kreme Doughnuts around Christmastime or if my cousin’s from the Yankee-lands came home (because at that time Krispy Kreme was a foreign entity in New England!). I remember as a youngster we would go out riding looking at Christmas lights, and one of our stops was always the brightest light around – the HOT sign at Krispy Kreme! We would come out with a dozen or two or three. Yet, as weird as it may seem, I think I might be the only person who does NOT like the Krispy Kreme Doughnuts when they are hot. I will eat them when they are hot, but the more of them I consume in that manner, the more sick I feel. So, that is why we usually get one dozen hot fresh doughnuts and one dozen assorted. We would eat our doughnuts as we continued our trek around town looking at Christmas lights.

As I have grown older and the Krispy Kreme locations have sprouted out to have little local stores, I still find that I must go to the main store in downtown Raleigh. Something about their doughnuts just taste different, they are fresher – maybe because they are from the REAL, original Krispy Kreme store or maybe it is merely a tradition for me. Either way, I would much prefer to drive downtown to get my doughnuts AND take in all the crazy sights that are always ongoing down there – especially now, that I have realized it really is not that far to the Krispy Kreme store. (My family always tried to keep that a secret from me evidently, ha!)

Everyone has their favorite doughnuts, right? What are yours? Hmmm…well as for me, I particularly love the chocolate iced with sprinkles or just your regular glazed crème filled (NOT Boston crème –yuck! but regular white crème!). My ultimate favorite was a special doughnut they made for their 75th birthday. It was a chocolate iced glazed with sprinkles, but in the middle, they filled it with the white crème. Ahhhhh…to die for!! No wonder I gained so much weight that year! And now, I have also come to LOVE their chocolate ice cream – Wow!, let me tell you, that is some good stuff and they will load it up in the cone for you. Annnnddddd…, let me add, yes, I have tried the Krispy Kreme cheeseburger that they have at the NC State Fair, and well, I LIKED it. A good mixture of sweet and salt combined and absolutely appealed to my appetite! Yummm…how can you go wrong with a Krispy Kreme Doughnut??

So whether you prefer Krispy Kreme or Dunkin Donuts or even the awesome ones from Sheetz gas stations, every so often, we deserve to reward ourselves with a sweet treat or two or twenty-four, ha! Go eat a doughnut or two and enjoy! And if you go to the Krispy Kreme (or as I call it, the “KK”), make sure you inhale and savor that blissful smell. I think they should bottle that up and sell it. That night walking out the steps of the Executive Mansion, made me also think of Hershey, Pennsylvania, and how the entire town smells like chocolate. Now, here in Raleigh, we smell like doughnuts – ahhhh!, what sweetness!

And now, that I have written this, I am experiencing a huge craving for some Krispy Kreme Doughnuts – you know what, forget the diet, I am going tonight or this weekend and catch-up on what I have been missing out on! Krispy Kreme makes me "Happy, Happy, Happy!"