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Doin' Doughnuts Right

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Written by Thom Ring

Allie's Donuts in North Kingstown, Rhode Island

Consider the humble doughnut.

It's a simple pastry. Mix a few basic ingredients into dough, roll the dough out, cut circles from the rolled-out dough, and deep-fry. Sure, there are a million ways to enhance a

doughnut's simple base with frostings and fillings, sugar and cinnamon. But the essence of a doughnut remains - humble.

As is often the case, though, making such a simple item special is anything but simple. And as the doughnut has seen its status as a breakfast-staple diminish, there is less incentive than ever to make much of an effort to do it.

These days most of the places that feature the word "doughnut" (or more accurately,"Donut") on their signs hardly offer a better product than the one you buy off the shelf of a grocery store. Knowing these tasty treats hardly can be considered health-food, you have to ask yourself, "Why bother eating one?"

Well, you're not off the hook. There still are places making doughnuts compelling enough to get you to ignore your diet. And the best place in Rhode Island to find them is Allie's Donuts in North Kingstown.

Allie's is an institution. It has been in business since 1968 in a humble wood-frame building on US Route 2 that reflects the simplicity of its primary product. Since then, this family-owned business has continued to make doughnuts the same way they used to be made everywhere, scratch-made from the best ingredients, and then hand-cut and fried.

The fact that few places make them this way has to do with more than just economics, although that's the big reason at the big places, as business-founder Allie Briggs quickly figured out.

"He was working three jobs, and he had seven kids," recalls his daughter, Anne Drescher. "The main object (of starting the business) was to have more time with his family. It turned out to be exactly the opposite.

"This is hard labor," she explained. "You're on your feet. You're using your hands.You're using your back. We don't use any machines."

The results are worth it. Allie's doughnuts are the size of bagels. Their plain "OldFashioned" doughnuts, with their crunchy outside and soft, cakelike centers, give you the elemental example of why Allie makes doughnuts that are worth breaking your diet.

But Drescher, who with her husband Bud bought the business in 1986, contends that making the doughnuts is the easy part of their success.

"We try to have good customer-service. Having good employees is the hardest part of doing business."

Yet having a good product is getting more challenging every day.

"Raw products have gone up (in price) almost ten-fold," says Drescher, "because they're harder to get. If you want frozen products that's easy. Everyone has those."

That's just one thing threatening the future of Allie's, adds Drescher.

"We've been for sale for ten years. I don't know how much longer we'll be here, but if someone comes along who's young and energetic, that'd be great."

It's sad to hear that Drescher and her husband might be looking to step away, but listen some more and you won't buy it.

"We like what we do," she finally admits. "We're a dinosaur. We'll probably die here."

Allie's Donuts is at 3661 Quaker Lane, Route 2, in North Kingstown, RI.