The Big Donut
by EC Pandzic
Most would yawn when waking at 1:00 a.m., but not Edgy. He’s used to the early rise and off to the donut shop where he starts baking donuts at 1:30 a.m. before leaving there for school at 7:30 a. m. His family is of modest means, so every bit helps. Baking donuts pays more than the jobs he could find after school; besides, Edgy likes working alone in the shop blaring his music while trying to keep to the baking schedule. There’s lots to do before the shop opens at 5:00 a.m.
The ‘raised’ dough makes the most common glazed, twisted and jelly donuts, then on the second roll of that same dough, you get cinnamon rolls and then lastly, fritters. But it’s a true dough and Edgy’s day begins by mixing its ingredients. After that he then kneads for a good ten minutes into a taut ball. This ball now needs resting so that the kneaded yeast will activate and expand the entire dough. Good Edgy thinks, that’s done for today.
The second kind of donut is a ‘cake’ donut. But that uses a mix and simply plops into the fryer using a machine. Still, Edgy has lots of those to make and in specific numbers based on the owner’s estimate of how each will sell. As Edgy takes each batch out of the fryer, Edgy finishes some in chocolate frosting, some in other frostings, some of those with sprinkles, some in simple powdered sugar and some in a cinnamon crumb. In between all that, Edgy retrieves his now risen raised dough, rolls and cuts that into donuts, then returns those to a proofer for more rising and expanding. It’s all quite a process of multitasking.
But as Edgy went to cover a dozen cake donuts in the crumb mix, he saw the bucket of the crumb mix was empty. He scrambled to make more crumb mix throwing sugar, cinnamon, and day-old cake donuts into a mixer. Though he changed the order of decorating cake batches to compensate for the missing crumb mix, he knew the machine is still producing hot cake donuts that need their decorations quickly, before they cool and nothing would stick to them. A stressful thirty minutes later, Edgy is done. But “Oh no!”
Edgy forgot the raised dough in the proofer and when he checks it, each uncooked donut has obviously overrisen and now has flopped over itself in a wet and spongy, air bubbly mess. Realizing it’s all unusable, Edgy got another dough going quickly.
By 5:00 a.m., Edgy is a little more stressed than usual, but all donuts were ready and looking good as Sally arrived to open the shop. Though Sally is a married woman about ten years older, Edgy and her are still pals and giggle at the same things. Now with a coworker in the shop, Edgy got a chance to talk about his stressful morning. Sally quickly apologized for not making a new batch of the crumb mix as she was scheduled to do the day before, but Edgy dismissed it as yesterday’s problem not to be dwelled on.
As Edgy began his daily clean-up, he noticed the unused dough even more of a mess than before. Just for fun, Edgy decides to re-knead it into a ball, then decided to make one single donut from the whole thing. Between customers Sally also got in on the act. With barely a rolling out, then using a bucket, a bowl and a knife to create it’s circular form, Edgy slid the massive donut into the fryer. Edgy and Sally laughed as they watched the monster cook having no expectations. But minutes later, it had risen and was brown enough for Edgy to flip it over. Minutes later, now both sides were done, and Edgy removed it from the fryer. Both commented on the wonderfully pronounced yellow ribbon between the golden-brown top and bottom that’s the trademark of a well-baked raised donut.
With a quick glaze, Sally and Edgy were pretty surprised how well it came out. Just then though, Tim, the donut shop owner walked in. Tim was not a morning person and sometimes, he was just in a foul mood regardless. And when he spotted the colossal donut resting on Edgy’s glaze table, he asked tersely, “What is that?!”
Edgy explained without mentioning that the crumb bucket was empty. Sally listened and was certainly appreciative of Edgy’s omission. However, the result was Tim thinking lesser of Edgy.
“So, you wasted an entire batch of dough! Who do you think has to pay for that?” Tim asked angrily.
“I’m sorry, sir. It won’t happen again.” Edgy replied
But just as Tim was to really lay into Edgy, a customer came through the door hailing Tim: “a fine good morning to ya’ Timmy.”
It was a regular customer who Tim typically spent a few minutes discussing politics with each morning. Today, that customer had saved Edgy from a browbeating. And then a regular stream of customers, some sitting inside to enjoy their coffees, prevented Tim from further admonishing Edgy until it was time for Edgy to leave for school. Noticing Edgy was on his way out, Tim asked Edgy if he could return after school to talk. Edgy feared that, but couldn’t say no and agreed to meeting Tim at 3:00 p.m.
As Sally and Tim handled the customers over the next couple of hours, the monstrous donut sitting on the baker’s table became the talk of the morning. Tim’s first instinct was to throw it away as it was distracting him and the customers from the in and out process Tim enjoyed controlling. But customers staying to sip their coffees couldn’t stop complimenting it and they were replaced by new ones coming in and doing the same. Humorously, Tim was getting beaten by the very thing that he was so angry about.
Two hours after Edgy left, the big donut was still the talk of the shop with customers now taking photos of it . . . or wanting photos with it. As the glass-encased donut showcase began to sell out, Sally suggested moving the monster into a proper place of prominence. Tim agreed as he was now happy to take credit for the popular oddity.
As customers came in and out, the regulars cheerfully chatted with lesser-known customers, and vice-versa, and both with Sally and Tim about the big donut. And today, instead of the begrudging owner, Tim was instead a hero of innovation.
Just then, one customer asked how much the donut was. Tim thought about it for a moment, then said he really didn’t know, but that it was about four dozen donuts of dough. The customer then described the dry and typically boring meeting he was on his way to, and said he was happy to pay that if Tim were to agree. Tim did, and happily too. Both Sally and Tim constructed a donut box big enough from standard donut boxes taped together as many customers looked on and chatted with the man about how the massive donut would be received at his meeting. I can tell you that it was very well received and differences between attendees there were immediately softened by their own stories of incredible treats.
Well, as every donut shop does, it emptied by around eleven o-clock. As Sally cleaned things up for the next morning, Tim was thinking hard how to use the colossal donut to be more successful. But perhaps a little embarrassed, he would wait until Sally left a couple of hours later to put an apron on a make one himself. Not entirely knowing how it came to be, Tim was stumped every step of the way. In his first attempt he ended up with basically a pancake, in his next, something that looked like something to avoid in a cow pasture. Humbled, he cleaned everything up before Edgy arrived at three.
Before Tim could speak, Edgy was again apologizing. Tim let him. Being boss was important to him and though it was no longer his immediate concern, Tim said it would be okay if Edgy were more responsible about his job and the costs. Then Tim added:
“Oh, by the way, I’ll be in early at 4:00 a.m. tomorrow. Maybe we can make the big donut again.”
Edgy was puzzled, but he agreed. The truth is, Tim would have to come clean the next day anyway, Sally was sure to tell Edgy the commotion his creation had made. But for now, Tim seemed more content easing into him being bested by the youngster.
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