"fried dough" news and stories

Eric (who's great, we hear) was wondering whether it's "doughnuts" or "donuts." So I'll do my best to answer.

Doughnuts is clearly the original spelling. According to the wiki on the subject, it's the only spelling listed in Thorndike and Lorge's The Teacher's Word Book of 30,000 Words.

I have no idea why that book is an authority. Usually, the Oxford English Dictionary is considered the be-all and end-all for words. But the British, well, they don't know from doughnuts, according to the Word Detective. He says it's a purely American treat, and the word's earliest known use was in Washington Irving's 1809 account of life in New York, when he described "balls of sweetened dough, fried in hog fat." There were no holes in the original version.

In my opinion, "Donut" is no better than "Minit" or "Kwik" or "Kopy" - a dumb misspelling created for cute-itude. It seems to date from the 1950s, when Dunkin' Donuts first hit the scene. So, then, "doughnut" is correct, unless you're referring to the products of the double D.

A few days ago, I did a post about a site that had a humorous cultural history of the dumpling. In a somewhat similar vein, here's an illustrated listing of fried dough from around the world. The site is hosted by OSO-ONO, a California-based wholesaler of fried dessert dough. Basically, they sell frozen bags of an all-purpose dough that they say can be used to make all kinds of donut-like things. I'm a little skeptical that one dough can do it all, but their chart of fried dough from different countries is great. There are dozens of items--from fry bread to beignets to gulab jamun--each with a photo and brief explanation. It seems like it would be a great jumping off point for any donut enthusiast looking for new ideas.