Kotas Reviews the Chips Ahoy Doughnuts

'Murica week continues here at Kotas Reviews Everything with a look at something nominally a breakfast item: The Humble Doughnut. My love of doughnuts is well documented on this blog, and today will only reinforce that notion. Homer Simpson and I have a lot in common, and a love of doughnuts is no exception to that rule. Dunkin' Donuts is a thoroughly American institution at this point, though more for the coffee than the doughnuts these days. America runs on Dunkin' as the jingle goes and all that. They do try and innovate in their food options as much as their celebrated love of the caffeinated bean. With that, we have today's subjects: The Chips Ahoy doughnuts.

What a delightful topping you've discovered.

Only in America would we look at a doughnut and say "You know, what this needs is a chocolate chip cookie". Well ladies and gentlemen, welcome to our bold new reality. I admit to hoping for something a little bit more interesting than "iced doughnut dipped in cookie bits", but I suppose that is the straightforward way to handle something like this. Chips Ahoy is not the best "off the shelf" chocolate chip cookie you can buy, but it certainly isn't the worst, so there really is no need to get overly complicated so long as the ultimate product comes out good. Right? 

Never, EVER look inside a specialty doughnut.

I did not have particularly high hopes for this doughnut. Chips Ahoy, while a staple of my childhood, never really seemed to go well with anything else for reasons I still do not understand. Maybe it's the weird over crumbliness or the fact that they always seemed just a bit too small to be a real cookie, but I felt they were best when served alone. My assertions in this matter were thoroughly borne out by the failure that is the "Chips Ahoy Creme" filled doughnut.  As shown above, the creme is a very unappetizing shade of light brown. I'm sure it seemed like a good idea to grind up a cookie and mix it with some kind of creme, but the result is a gloppy, gritty overly sweet mess that tastes vaguely like crappy cookie dough. It's edible, I suppose, but it is certainly not GOOD. The crumbles on top have a weird off flavor that is kind of like Chips Ahoy, but not quite. It is what I imagine artificial Chips Ahoy Cookie flavoring would taste like...as if you could get any more manufactured. 

The non-filled edition of this doughnut is another matter. It is lazier than the filled one, but in a way that makes it a higher quality product because it's starting from a better base. It's really hard to fuck up chocolate iced doughnut and yet...here we are. The crumbles do them no favors, as they do not taste good, but the base doughnut isn't horrible, so the whole experience is very "meh". Dunkin', I am disappoint.

On the FACE Rating System, these doughnuts get separate scores: 2 frowny faces for the filled version, and 0 faces for the non-filled version. The filled one tastes like they used a recipe made up by a 4 year old: Sounds good, but the sad reality is a gloppy mess. The other one is more a problem of the quality of the ingredients, but the base item isn't bad, so it's not terrible. I would just avoid these all together, even if you like Chips Ahoy. You will be disappointed and sad.