Vegan Donuts - Yes You Can!

Some of the choices at Dottie's Donuts

I have a confession to make. I used to hate donuts. Or doughnuts.  I never know what to call them, so I'm going to go back and forth here.

When I was a kid, I attended a secular humanist Yiddish school on Sunday mornings and at break time, we had donuts and coffee.  I was about 8 when I started this. Maybe the donuts were bad, maybe the coffee upset my stomach, but I learned to love coffee and hate the donuts, which sat like lead in the pit of my stomach.

The maple cinnamon donut made it as far as the car

Then Dunkin Donuts came to Long Island when I was in high school. I used to go there with my boyfriend and we'd eat munchkins and complain about the weak coffee and gross donuts.

Even when I was pregnant, I resisted the lure of the donut. I worked at a parenting magazine when I was pregnant with my youngest, and every Friday, we got a delivery of several dozen Krispy Kreme donuts. These turned my stomach - could have been the pregnancy - but I avoided donuts for the next 19 years.

The cookie monster lurking in the back - amazing

Then came Dough. These doughnuts were nothing like the ones of ore; they used seasonal ingredients, organic produce and were healthy and low calorie.

OK, obviously the last part of that was not true. But I came to appreciate artisan donuts, with their unique flavor combinations and absurdly high prices.

I've since sampled the local doughnut scene in Portland, OR: Voodoo and Blue Star; Brooklyn: Doughnut Plant and now Dottie's Donuts, in Philadelphia.

Dottie's is vegan, which means no bacon on the doughnuts (I appreciate this - I've had doughnuts that have inadvertently picked up a stray bit of pork from a neighboring doughnut) and no lard used to fry the donuts. But they taste great - for anyone leery of this, rest assured that they have all that donutty goodness - rich icing, flavorful filling, cake-y, large donuts. And they are only $2.50 or so apiece.  At some cafes in New York, Dough's are $5 each.

The chocolate made it home, minus some of its glaze

We inhaled the Cookie Monster, a chocolate glazed donut filled with a peanut butter cookie and topped with chocolate sprinkles. It was divine. We also shared the maple cinnamon, with perfect glaze, the lemon poppy and simple chocolate glazed.  Then we ran the 90 miles back to New York. [note: we didn't eat all of each doughnut. We shared].

Dottie's is a little out of the way, a tiny unassuming spot in West Philly. I was test driving a 2017 Nissan Rogue, and going to check out the Eastern State Penitentiary, so this was a great place to fuel up before touring the prison museum.

There are only about a dozen or so flavors each day, so if you have your mind set on a certain flavor, you might be disappointed.  Or you just might have to return.

Note: Nissan loaned me the Rogue.

Nissan Gives Back: The Force is With Them

Our ride for the day: A 2017 Nissan Rogue

Every year, Nissan arranges a volunteer day in New York City, where they invite auto writers and bloggers to help the community. For the second year in a row, we spent the day at the New York Common Pantry, a food pantry in East Harlem, giving bags of food to the working poor and needy.

The food pantry gives low income families and needy individuals and bag of fresh, healthy food every other week, as a supplement to other food programs. What's unique about this program is that the beneficiaries can choose what grains, proteins and fresh fruits and vegetables they prefer, from a changing list of purchased and donated items. Our job, along with Nissan execs, was to put together the food bags, and throw in a couple of extras: fresh sandwiches, salads and other donated goodies.

The pantry resembled a vegetarian's kitchen: bags of dried beans, eggs, fresh sweet potatoes, beets, carrots and lots of lots of bananas. Whole grain pastas, grits and oatmeal, milk, and canned tomatoes filled the bags and recipients carefully packed their bags into grocery carts or wheelie suitcases.

Holiday cheer at Maxwell's Central Park

As usual, after the day of hard work, Nissan treated us to appetizers and drinks, this year at Maxwell’s Central Park. The bar food included a vegetarian friendly black bean dip with guacamole and a jicama and red pepper relish, spinach dip served with really spicy pita chips and sweet potatoes fries.

An extra treat
We were chauffeured to the bar in a fleet of brand new 2017 Nissan Rogues. The compact SUVs seat 5 and we were all comfortable on our short drive.

The main event
After fueling up (on drinks and appetizers) we took a much longer ride downtown for the main event: a special private screening of the new movie, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. Nissan is capitalizing on the car's to tie in with the movie.

Thanks Nissan: private screening of Rogue One

Besides the name, Nissan Rogue has nothing to do with Rogue One, which is all spaceships and Rebel warriors. Plus intergalactic warfare, martial arts and geeky allusions to other Star Wars movies; blink and you'll miss R2-D2 and C-P3O.

I loved the original Star Wars movies, but never saw the later films; it was fun to jump back into the franchise and even get a peek at Princess...well, I don't want to give anything away.  See it for yourself.