Voodoo Doughnuts

Almost every list I've found of the things that must be done when in Portland, has included a visit to Voodoo Doughnuts. Not too surprising since they've been featured on a lot of national TV shows and in magazines from Food & Wine to Playboy. Which of course begs the question - what's so great about these doughnuts?

Maybe it's the urban legends that have built up around the no-longer-available-flavors-by-order-of-the-health-department, NyQuil glaze and vanilla Pepto crushed Tums. Maybe it's all the other funky (but not in the health-department-needs-to-get-involved way) flavors like the raised doughnuts covered in all your favorite cereals or the maple bar that comes complete with slices of bacon on top. Maybe it's the irreverent names like the Gay Bar (full of "luscious cream" no less) and the Maple Blazer Blunt, a perfect way to cure your munchies.

We've driven and walked by the original Voodoo location a few times, but there is always a line out the door. Seriously. And you know what one of my least favorite things to do is? Wait in a really long line with two children who can't stop whining about how they want doughnuts and when is it going to be our turn and why are you pretending you're not our mommy? Waaaaaaa! Seriously.

Then the magical oracle at our house - otherwise known as the Internet - informed me that there is another location! Well technically there are two other locations, but I'm not driving to Eugene for a doughnut. But I might go out of my way while driving through Eugene.

Early one Saturday morning after dropping Monkey Man off at the airport, I took the boys to Voodoo Doughnuts Too to see if we could get some of the doughnut magic without the line and the whining and the me pretending those two aren't my children. Of course getting there required me to drive in circles through an unfamiliar part of town while being teased mercilessly by the sweet scent of doughnuts somewhere nearby. Which led to me driving like such a doofus that I made a public apology to all the other Portland drivers on the road that morning.

And here is what we got for the effort...

Cha-Cha, the family baconinator, went for the bacon topped maple bar, I had a Raspberry Romeo, and Quake had a Voodoo Doll, complete with raspberry filling, pretzel "stake", and a horrified look on it's face. You may also see evidence in this photo of Quake's first doughnut, a Dubble Bubble, which I'm sure he ordered just to see if I'd gag.

I guess it's no surprise that the next time we had to make a morning trip to the airport the boys begged for another trip to Voodoo. This time there was cereal and M&Ms involved...

And I actually got a photo of the now much beloved favorite Voodoo Doll before it was half gone!

At least this one didn't look scared so much as just confused. And look! There was another Dubble Bubble! I hate it when they order things I'm not willing to eat the leftovers of. Now if I can just plan a trip there by myself so I can order a Cock-N-Balls without the need to explain it to their shrinks in 20 years...