Locals, visitors celebrate National Doughnut Day

Tabitha Johnston/Chronicle Taylor Gulotta, left, of Florida, and Hannah Palmatary, of Maryland, stop by the Sweet Shop Bakery in Shepherdstown on National?Doughnut Day, Friday afternoon, to get drinks and a sourdough doughnut.
Visitors to Shepherdstown Sweet Shop Bakery walked out of the shop a little sweeter last Friday.
To celebrate National Doughnut Day, the bakery made dozens of doughnut holes to offer to customers throughout the day.
“It’s sort of a day we can’t ignore. We’ve celebrated it for several years,” said Shepherdstown Sweet Shop Bakery owner Pam Berry.
Berry said the bakery made four times the number of doughnuts it usually bakes, and said she appreciates how National Doughnut Day benefits her staff.
“I think it gives the staff the opportunity to be creative,” Berry said. “The staff will sit down and come up with special ideas for the day, and maintain a list of great ideas from past years.”
One of the day’s specialty doughnuts, the Sweet Heat doughnut – a peanut butter mousse-filled doughnut topped with chocolate glaze, peanut pieces and habanero chips – was declared West Virginia’s best doughnut by Food Network in March.
“We almost chose the crazy one with habanero chips on top of it,” said Hannah Palmatary, of Maryland, who was on a college graduation road trip with her friend Taylor Gulotta, of Florida. The friends, who met as students at Washington and Lee University, ended up sharing one of the sour cream doughnuts.
“I’ve always liked sour cream doughnuts – it’s a traditional, but exciting, choice,” Palmatary said.
“We did know it was National Doughnut Day, because of social media. We were just taking a little road trip, and stopped here,” Gulotta said.
Barista Autumn Cheeks said she was surprised to see most people choosing glazed doughnuts over the 11 other specialty varities offered in honor of the day.
“On doughnut day we give away free doughnut holes – lots of people have been coming in for that,” said Cheeks, a Shepherd University sophomore. “Definitely more people than usual asked for doughnuts. Even regulars that usually get a croissant got a doughnut today.”
Cheeks said four varieties of doughnuts are available on any other day of the year at the shop.
Although she wasn’t part of the bakery’s doughnut brainstorming meeting, Cheeks said she enjoyed taste-testing some of the specialty doughnuts the bakers created.
“My favorite part is seeing the ideas they come up with and the work that goes into making them,” Cheeks said.