Stopping For Donuts At St John’s

By Eliza Hallabeck

A sign at the intersection in Sandy Hook Center reminded residents on Saturday that from 9 am until noon St John’s Episcopal Church was holding its annual Donut Stop. The damp weather may have moved this year’s event inside, but that did not stop the aroma of freshly made donuts from greeting visitors as they stepped out of their cars in the church’s back parking lot.

By just after 10 am, the event, and the volunteers, who took on titles for the day like Donut Order Filler and Donut Catcher, had served up more than 30 orders.

People had started arriving at this year’s Donut Stop ten minutes before the event began. Tables were set up for visitors to sit while eating a donut and enjoying, coffee, hot chocolate, or orange juice.

As Donut Maker for the day, Bruce Moulthrop said there are a few tricks to making the perfect donut.

“You cook them on each side for just a couple minutes,” said Mr Moulthrop. “You constantly keep turning them so you have an even brown color on both sides, and you want the temperature at 375 degrees.”

When visitors walked in to the church’s basement, they were greeted and asked to fill out a donut order for one, half a dozen, or a dozen donuts.

From there visitors handed their order to either JoAnn Hornak or Cecelia Dalzell, the Donut Order Fillers. Ms Hornak and Ms Dalzell would then wait for the proper number of donuts to be cooked, and would serve them up plain, or with cinnamon and sugar.

Inside the kitchen Steve Zakur, the day’s Dough Loader, maintained the proper amount of dough in the donut dispenser for Mr Moulthrop, who would use the dispenser to drop new batches of donuts in to cook. Once done, Donut Herder John Berger would monitor the donuts as they were scooped up and placed down before Donut Catcher Erica Knapp, who loaded the donuts onto a rack and transferred them through a serving window to the two Donut Order Fillers.

Video of the event can be found at www.newtownbee.com or on The Newtown Bee’s Facebook page.