Beach City Baked Donuts (Redondo Beach, CA)

There's a new donut place in town. I love the donut, and I was especially intrigued by these because they are BAKED and not fried.

I visited Beach Cities Baked Donut in Redondo Beach. The store, owned by Koji Shimooka and Gina Samejima, cooks the donuts in waffle press-like machines. According to an article in the Daily Breeze, Koji saw these donuts in his native Japan and brought back the idea.

The donut's texture is spongy and cakey...nothing close to the airy, super sweet texture of Krispy Kreme donuts. It tastes like many Japanese cakes - so I loved them. However, they are definitely are not the prettiest donuts!

The plain donut is $1.25 and the rest are $1.50 each. The mixed dozen is $15.00. Yes, way more than Krispy Kreme, but I think of these more of a Starbucks muffin or loaf type of treat. Because they don't have a glaze (or the deep fry grease), they are drier and less sweet than your usual donut. I suggest having a nice cup of tea, coffee or milk with these donuts. The donut shop has a coffee bar as well as chilled bottled drinks.

I bought:
Honey Drip
Golden Soy (Kinako)
Coco
Cinnamon Sugar
Chocolate Chocolate Chip

Unfortunately, the Green Tea donuts weren't ready when I stopped by. Each donut is individually wrapped. I've found many Japanese and Asian pastries are packaged this way...yes, probably a violation of the Kyoto Protocol, but helpful if you want to save your treat for later.

The store has three of these machines in the front of the store so you can watch the donuts being made.

I recently bought a new mini-donut maker from King Arthur (I'm working on a post about these)...and I wonder if I can recreate some of the flavors at home.

My favorite was the Golden Soy donut. It is covered in Kinako (soybean flour) and sugar. I am definitely heading back to try the green tea as I love green tea or matcha flavored anything! I also want to try their specialty donuts such as Earl Grey, Apricot and Japanese Sweet Potato.

My co-workers liked the Golden Soy and Honey Drip donuts. Least favorite were the chocolate chocolate chip and coco donuts.

Honey Drip (plain) and the Coco baked donut

Bottom Line: I don't think Homer Simpson would approve of these baked donuts because they don't have enough fat and sugar, but I think Lisa Simpson would like them! :)

Location:
Beach City Baked Donuts
Where: 501 N. Pacific Coast Highway @ Beryl, Redondo Beach
Hours: 6 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily. Phone: 310-303-3159

Articles/Photos:
Daily Breeze newspaper article: Baking, yes baking, a healthier doughnut, by Melissa Heckscher, Wednesday, July 8, 2009.

Here are some nice photos from the Daily Breeze.

Donut Peach Galette for You Want Pies with That?

For this month's You Want Pies with That? challenge, Rebecca of Ezra Pound Cake and Mary of Alpineberry came up with this month's theme: Taste of Summer Pie!

Summer to me is all about stone fruit. I love stone fruit. I grew up eating peaches from my parent's backyard. The house always had apricots, plums and nectarines from the store. I remember when I discovered the goodness that is the white peach and nectarine. And I jump for joy when I first see the mango-flavored nectarine at the Farmer's Market at the beginning of summer. And don't get me started about my special relationship with the pluot...

Have you tried the Donut or Saturn peach? It's a sweet, squat white peach that, well, looks like a donut or the rings of Saturn. (Yes, I bet that one was hard to figure out! :)

By the way, I've used this green platter in a few posts. It is a piece of Mary Law Pottery. She has a great studio in Berkeley, CA. I bought it when I got my bread platter by Gary Holt (see this post), and I forgot to showcase this one! Check out Mary Law's website...and visit her studio if you ever visit Northern California.

For this one, I wanted to keep the donut shape so I just rinsed it off and plopped the lovely fruit (with pit) on my completely misshapen pie crust. I had some frozen ginger spice cookies I made last week so I crumbed some of them underneath. And I dropped some butter and sugar on top. Bake and eat. Yum.

Be sure to check out the other You Want Pies with That? pies and delights!

Recipe:
Pie Crust: 1 1/4 c flour, dash of salt, 1 stick butter, 2 1/2 T ice water (a variation of Martha Stewart's Pie Crust)
Saturn or Donut Peach
Ginger Spice Cookie crumbs