Joanie Loves Chachi

In case you missed its genesis in the comments over the past few days, a book group is forming with some Trail Baboon readers leading the way. Thanks to Anna for setting up Blevins’ Book Club. Ground rules and selecting a first book are the topics under discussion. Take a look!

I’m proud to say a new blog has been opened up by people who met here for the first time. We are expanding our digital real estate – before long the virtual world may be covered with Trail Baboon spinoffs and the sun will never set on a fresh conversation. This is what it must have felt like for the creators of “Happy Days” when major characters started to get their own series.

I mentioned this to marketing expert and idea man Spin Williams, and he was ecstatic.

“It’s exactly this sort of thing that led to the creation of our own research and development technique several decades ago, before the Internet even got started. We call it ‘The Meeting That Never Ends’. At our L.A. offices, we have a conference room open 24/7. Our gathering is always in session so we can respond immediately to newest opportunities in a changing world. There is a sharpened pencil and a clean notepad at every seat. The coffee is on indefinitely. And I’ve arranged for an endless supply of donuts to be delivered, much in the way Joe DiMaggio sent roses to Marilyn Monroe’s crypt three times a week for 20 years! We never adjourn!”

I love Spin for his enthusiasm, but I can only imagine what coffee that is on “indefinitely” must taste like. And if the purpose of the ‘Meeting That Never Ends’ is to ‘respond immediately to the newest opportunities’, how come it remains stuck in a physical conference room? Did they miss social networking websites completely?

Spin talks a good game about being nimble and embracing change, but he is very much set in his ways and wedded to ritual. It must be the donuts. Once you’ve had a few thousand Bismarcks, it becomes difficult to push away from the table and virtually impossible to get out the door. No wonder the conference room is always open.

Name your favorite donut.

97 thoughts on “Joanie Loves Chachi”

  1. Those fried cinnamon rolls are always good. But chocolate is never safe around me either.

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  2. Rise and Pick up the Sticks from your Yard Babooners!
    A big stormy wind last night has my yard full of sticks this morning. 1/2″ in the rain gauge, too. When I arrived home last night after work, I got out of the car immediately after a lightening strike in the area. Eerie rumbles were bouncing from the clouds to the ground and back again accompanied by a strange light. I felt like I arrived on another planet! Which was good. It was a rough week at work. A new planet is a nice thought.
    Donuts, or doughnuts, are a lovely, fattening thought. My favorite childhood donut was the bag of buttermilks from Vandermeer’s Bakery in LeMars, Iowa. They made them for Saturday mornings. Fresh buttermilks and a glass of milk — heaven. That bakery was sold sometime in the last 10 years, so they are no more. Sigh. Now, my favorite is an old fashioned sour cream donut from Lunds with a thin sweet glaze, with coffee and cream. 170 calories and a rare treat. smile.

    Perhaps for the cyber book club we could have a plate of virtual donuts! 0 caleries each.

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    1. Jacque… not too many sticks in my yard, although all the lawn chairs were knocked over. However, three houses up, the massive tree in the back yard came down. Luckily it was the perfect fall… took off a little corner of the garage, but missing the glass topped table, the house and best of all, the powerlines (fell just 2 feet from them). I’m sure a bunch of us will be out later w/ out chainsaws!

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      1. We had funnel clouds all around us; you could watch them on local TV. Kato TV is worse than Duluth but they do cover local heavy weather extremely well.

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      2. Clyde,
        I was tuned in to KEYC last night too. I have lots of friends over your way. I hope you and your family are okay today. Pretty exciting last night!

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    2. Vandermeers! Loved their sprouted wheat bread and runzas. Last time I checked, a younger couple had bought Vandermeers and was looking into bringing back some of the old favorites. That was 2 years ago. I just googled them and they still seem to be going. Really need to try and recreate the sprouted wheat bread on my own.

      My parents have since moved from the area, so not sure when we will get back there, but I do want to have my son climb the Ocheeydan Mound someday soon. (used to be the highest point in Iowa, until advanced surveying placed it in someone’s hoglot-the mound I believe is the result of glaciation).

      When I was in college, I worked at the nursing home and Eva Vander Meer was one of the residents.

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      1. I worked at Good Sam too! Would have been the summers of ’80 and ’81, just before they became for profit (do not go there). First worked laundry and housekeeping, then as an aid. Some of the most satisfying work I have ever done.

        Did you have short, dark curly hair then? Something is tickling the back of my memory.

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      2. Catherine– Short hair, but dishwater blonde. I worked there in 1974. My sister worked from about 1971-77. Our mother was the much feared Mrs. Stratton (3rd grade teacher at Franklin School) so everybody knew us. My uncle is Mr. Hoey the History teacher at LCHS. I left the town in 1975 .

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  3. Now long gone, but the raised doughnuts at Lex’s bakery in Two Harbors. A favorite myth was that you could tell how well Louie was doing in his football bets by the size of the hole. He once gave us the recipe for a cookbook in 1882 after he retired. He gave us the recipe the only way he knew it, which started with 6 and 1/2 quarts of eggs.
    But the demise of the local neighborhood or small town bakery is a tragedy. Why were places like Lex’s so much better at dougnuts and such?

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  4. Glazed old-fashioned. Hands down. Really good if you heat them up just a bit. But I never buy more than one, or else I’d eat them all.

    Have you noticed that no one ever brings donuts to the office anymore. Don’t get me wrong, I love bagels… but it’s all you ever see anymore. Maybe Monday I’ll stop at the Donut Connection on the way to work!

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    1. One of my workplaces had an interesting tradition. A woman announcing pregancy would bring donuts. Makes one very careful about bringing donuts to work!

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      1. One of the first places I worked (a corporate law dept of all places) you brought donuts in on your own birthday. Kind of backwards, but what the heck — donuts are just fun anytime!

        One of my favorite female bosses at Pillsbury just loved her birthday. Where most people try not to make a deal about their birthday or downplay it, Barb openly celebrated and loved to plan her own party at work. Very refreshing …

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    2. At the animal shelter where I volunteer, Sue brings donuts, nice caloric ones from the Donut Star, every Friday. No bagels for us!

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  5. Interesting that Panera does not even do doughnuts.
    Okay, all, I need a sense of normalcy to day, so I an expecting the usual insanity.

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    1. Hey Clyde–hope the treatment is going well. I have the arrow on my head. Gotta go find a rubber chicken. I do have a real one in the freezer I can carry around. By the end of your treatment everyone could smell it and the flies should follow me everywhere.

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  6. I remember having donuts from Bloedow’s (SP?) Bakery in Winona while on vacation. That was probably the last real small town bakery I’ve been to. I have to say, I could never understand what the fuss was about Krispy Kreme donuts – people would go nuts about them, but to me they seeemed sort of small and disappointing and not very fresh.

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  7. Good morning donut eaters and some that probably aren’t.

    My Aunt Ora’s home made donuts were the best. However, I will eat just about any kind as long as they are sweet which they always are. Maple frosting is always good. Cream filling is no prefered, but lemon would be okay. Organic donuts would be most prefered if this is possible. Most people who like healthy organic food probably would not eat donuts, but I can not turn down a donut.

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  8. Dale,
    This is not related to the post, but I am in need of your quick assistance if you’re around today- or any of you other blog readers. A good Irish friend is turning 60 today and I’d like to make him a mix of some funny Irish tunes. Any recommendations? What’s the name of the song where the guy has all those horrible things happen to him…” at work today.” Something like that. Thanks for your help!
    Sarah

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    1. Do you know “Short Fat Fanny” by (I think) Four Men and a Dog?

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      1. Or the Chieftains’ recording of “Give the Fiddler a Dram” is pretty spectacular.

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    2. Not traditional by any stretch, but I believe it is De Danaan that does the celtic version of Bohemian Rhapsody (the Queen classic) that always makes me laugh myself silly. Called Hibernian Rhapsody-heard it years ago on Thistle and Shamrock.

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    3. Sarah,
      Sorry it took me so long to get to you on this, but “Dear Boss” is the title of the song, as others have already said.
      And it’s true … EVERYTHING is on Youtube.

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  9. ok, Clyde – my maternal Grandma made raised, glazed donuts – quite a delicacy. and at Vern’s cafe, in 1962 in Arlington where i worked as a waitress, Vern would make cake donuts fresh almost every day. one of my duties was to sweep the back dining room floor (with that sticky compound – remember that?) and he would always put the donuts to cool in the window between the dining room and the kitchen. hard to resist them – but i was 16 and much more disciplined than i am now 🙂
    there’s a little bakery in Moose Lake and whenever i’m in ML i stop for an apple fritter. one day it was later in the afternoon, and the woman at the counter said i could have a box full (about a dozen, i think) for $5. i bought them, and Steve and i had donuts for supper that night. it was great.

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  10. The son and heir casts his vote for the Bismarcks with the red jelly, but he says the lemon are good too. Trying to think of the last time we even HAD those. Scones are much easier for me to make, so that is what we usually have at home, but now that you have me thinking this way, guess I will have to have one at the coffee shop this am.

    Have already been to the Farmer’s Market (St Paul) where everything looks beautiful and I have to remind myself I can come back next week and should only get what we can eat this week. Later this fall, there will be wonderful cider/cinnamon donuts there.

    Checked out the garden, which is minimal this year. Doesn’t look too trashed, but the proud hydrangea has been brought to it’s knees-Hopefully it will recover.

    Joanne-I heard Big Lake was in the middle of some nasty weather-are you ok? Glad to hear you were spared the worst of it, Clyde.

    Krispy Kremes, like the Tiny Tim’s at the fair must be consumed immediately at the moment you can stand to touch them once they have emerged from the grease, otherwise, they are disgusting.

    The trick with the coffee is to have enough addicts around that you are continually in need of a fresh pot.

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    1. Yes, thank you, Catherine — we’re OK, but we certainly received a thrashing last night. Of course, I was caught driving to/from karate during a constant downpour. That 5-mile trip turned into a very long drive …

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      1. Catherine – my hydrangea took the worst hit of all my flowers/bushes as well. I think I’ll tie a string up on the fence for them to hang their heavy heads on today.

        SO.,.. who here has an a ebelskiver? I just got one last week and haven’t played with it yet. But it looks like the final product will be related to a donut!

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      2. Sherrilee – my mom used to make ebelskivers. Oh so yummy. I have a pan somewhere rattling around the house, but haven’t yet tried to make them. Doughy goodness.

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  11. Chocolate covered cake donuts from World’s Best Donuts in Grand Marais. Warm and just a little crispy on the outside, melt-in-your-mouth good on the inside. The summer I worked in Grand Marais after college, I won a dozen of ’em. Ate donuts all the way home on the drive back to Minneapolis.

    Best from childhood memory: cinnamon rolls and caramel rolls in the kitchen at Gustafson’s across the street. The smell of fresh-baked cinnamon rolls is a little slice of heaven on earth.

    (Sarah – I think the title you’re looking for is either “Dear Boss” or “Why Paddy’s Not at Work Today”…pretty sure it’s a Clancy Bros. tune.)

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    1. My sister and specialize in caramel rolls and fresh pies! They are too wonderful for words. However, several Christmases ago I took caramel rolls to my brother’s house for a special treat. I had baked them in those black plastic re-heatable pans. I did not realize my brother’s stove did not heat evenly. The uneven heat set the pan on fire and took a fire extinguisher to put out the flames which emerged from the oven. Mortifying. And we did not get to eat the rolls.

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  12. Panera came to Mankato and the local bagel shop went out of business. So now we go to Panera very often because it is good in its way, but they do not make boiled bagels. I miss that too. I go to Ensteins in the Cities when we can.
    By the way, for those tracking this, my daughter is taking my wife up to see her sister today. Then my daughter can do a bit of ministry for her aunt, too.

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  13. Greetings! Donut day — I love it! My favorites have always been the jelly-filled bismarcks or the custard-filled long johns. A good sweet filling makes all the difference for me — otherwise it’s just all sugary bread. I can’t even remember the last time I ate a donut, as I usually try to avoid that kind of indulgence.

    All you trivia types, maybe you can explain to me why they’re called bismarcks — I never understood that. Especially after reading “The Sinking of The Bismarck” in grade school.

    When I worked at Pillsbury, there were baked goods everywhere at every meeting — I gained at least 50 lbs working there, as I couldn’t resist all the temptation. So now I just don’t buy that kind of thing at all.

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  14. My great grandmother (Luella Boone, related to the famous one) used to bake wonderful sugar-coated doughnuts every Sunday. People would walk across the street to her home after each Sunday’s services were finished. They’d sit in her living room and eat doughnuts, talking about that day’s service.

    When I was a kid in Ames, I worked three summers in a factory across the alley from our Maid Rite shop (that was a chain of hamburger shops in Iowa). My breakfast every day was three or four raised doughnuts with a generous icing made of dark, fudgey chocolate. I haven’t found their equal except one time in Ashland, Wisconsin, near my cabin. Now I find doughnuts so fattening I can’t even type about them without expanding. I haven’t had one in many years.

    What do we know about this new blogging group?

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      1. Probably. The early Boones were amazingly fertile. They routinely had families with 12 or 14 kids. It is nothing special to have Boones in your family tree because they sure knew how to procreate. And then they spread out over the whole country.

        People think Dan’l Boone kept moving west to find unspoiled country. Nope. He was always just a short jump ahead of a lawsuit. That cat was in legal trouble all his life, so he kept moving to lawless places.

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      1. Steve – my paternal grandmother’s name was Louella. Best grandma in the whole world!
        Does anyone have a pretty darn good maid rite recipe? What’s the difference between maid rites, loose meats, taverns and sloppy joes?

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      2. OKAY! I do not understand how to use these new tags and attributes. I was trying to type, “what’s the difference among?” with among in italics, but obviously I need a tutor. Anyone???

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      3. I think you can do italics with an “i” inside carats ” at the front end of hour word and then the same at the end of the word with a slash ‘/’ ahead of the “i” (like this if I’m right) .

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      4. Arg – WordPress strips out the sideways carats, even when I try to put them in quotes… put your “i” and “/i” on either side of the word you want to italic and use the carats above the comma and period like parens around the “i”….

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      5. We always thought the Eat Maid-Rite Eats signs were hilarious as we had never heard “eats” used as a noun in our house.

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  15. Steve, you mean the BBC? I guess we know we have quite a few people wanting the online version. I am hoping the face-to-face version is also going to go. I think we have to name a book and a due date. I do not think the two forms have to do the same book. For the online version, I am up for most things. Will do 3 Bags but am not sure if it is the best discussion book, but I sort of read about 1/4 while waiting for and following the worst medical procedure of my life. So may have to reread it. Lots of tricky details and the narrative jumps around a lot with lost of holes filled in later.

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      1. I just created a separate online blog for BBC – both for planning an in-person group as well as online discussion. That way we don’t muddy up whatever our theoretical topic is here…at least not too much.

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    1. i am in favor of the online doing a seperate deal. otherwiase the discussion at the in person one would be ackwward either referenceing the other one or wondering what the bloggers would be thinking. lets do one online and a seperate one for the minnehaha group. three bags for the online group and a separate one for the face to face. clyde if you wabnt to do a menas face to face i would be ok with putting together a monthly saturday commute to mankato with whoever else wanted in. steve jim aaron. i have heard of guys groups in the irish joint in minneapolis (kieran”s i believe and they have the ability to succeed in a different way without all these damn women mucking up the water with girly choices. cmon what do you say men!!! captain billy ccould join us too.

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      1. Thanks, tim, but my life is way to up in the air. I wasn’t thinking of me. I was thinking of your first point, that who could track who said what where.

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      2. If there is a girly group and a guy group, I’m gonna go with the girls. My tastes in literature match theirs better than they match guy books (although I don’t do vampires). Men are so darned aggressive, wanting to do all the talking. Put me with the girls, please.

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  16. Heading north out of Atoka, Oklahoma. If we don’t stop for anything we could be in Minneapolis just past midnight 🙂

    I have to go look up what a Bismarck is.

    My favourite doughnut is red/strawberry jelly-filled. In Malaysia in the late ’80s, Dunkin Donuts had lovely squishy ones. When I was in NYC 20 years later, I went to DD — what a disappointment! The doughnut was crusty with crystalline sugar, and the jelly wasn’t hardly trying to be any sort of fruit flavour. I don’t think I finished it. Krispy Kreme jelly-filled are the same way – I’m guessing the jelly probably comes from the same pipe as DD.

    I thought the Cities’ doughnut scene a little lacking, especially for someone who wasn’t a huge fan of cake doughnuts.

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  17. Oh oh oh I forgot — another doughnut-related anecdote: Husband’s last place of work had “a doughnut every Friday” written into his contract. This was in Boulder, CO.

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    1. This is pretty food based today! Do you suppose there will be an incredible run on donuts at local bakeries today? If there is, Dale, YOU are responsible.

      Mn-TX–Donuts and coffee are good traveling food. Should show up in your lipids tomorrow.

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      1. Did indeed have the chocolate smothered cake donut at the coffee shop this morning-being a nice person, I left the one encrusted with sprinkles for someone considerably younger, it seemed the right thing to do.

        Jacque, I was in Le Mars after your time, it almost would have been too weird if you had been the person I was thinking of. I’ve had lots of random reappearances from my past of late (all good, I am happy to say). I think Ganesha has been overly busy of late in my direction. Love the flaming carmel roll story, but bet it was an unholy mess at the time.

        Sherillee, ebelskivers are actually more like apple pancake balls. Know them well from my childhood among the Danes of Iowa. Those dear old saints made the best food I ever hope to eat and taught me to drink coffee.

        Steve, finally got the book beginning downloaded.

        Dale, have moved picking up the bike from the repair shop up my priority list to work this donut off -thanks a million!

        Picking up the yard would probably be a good idea too-off to get ready to watch the World Cup-is it too unpatriotic to hope Ghana wins? US has so much already, do we need this too?

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      2. Jacque — Sadly the only doughnut-shaped food I’ve had today is Cheerios. Will have to see if I can find a (hot) doughnut at a truck stop. Or pie! Food cravings are so contagious.

        catherine — mmm Danish pancake balls… I’ve only ever had the plain ones (lived next to the Danish American Center in Mpls for a bit).

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  18. I’m not doughnut fan but Lund’s Killer brownies are heaven-but only once or twice a year. They must be 2000 calories each.

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  19. Beinets at Cafe Du Monde in New Orleans. Nothing beats sitting in the French Quarter at the corner of Jackson Square listening to the varieties of street music while covered in powdered sugar from those incredible square confections. Second runner up would be the beinets from the Cafe Du Monde booth at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. Same great music – just not in the Quarter. Now I need Satchmo “do you know what it means, to miss New Orleans…”.

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    1. i hear dr john doing it too. thats cheating but bienets from cafe du monde in new orleans they are absolutly the best. the other best i have had are the little pastries in italy where you go in the shop and they have all those little mini quiche looking things and the ones with phyllo dough and the exploding flavors in your mouth but no heavy feeling after you eat 4,5 6 of them. a black coffee and a little walk afterweard and life is good

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  20. Hands down, Sunshine Food Markets in Sioux Falls make the best cake donuts around.
    Glazed raised are second rate in my book.

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  21. I LOATHED Joanie Loves Chachi. As spinoffs go, my vote goes to Maude, I think. I remember well that, as a child, I was utterly baffled by the relationship between characters on “Green Acres” and “Petticoat Junction.” How did they sometimes end up on each others’ shows? HOw could that BEEEEE?

    Re: donuts: I spent several years traversing Canada and wondering what in the heck Tim Horton’s shops sold. (“Always fresh!”) I made the mistake of finding out. Now, it is all I can do to drive past an outlet, knowing that, inside, I can find a sour cream glazed Tim Bit. My only salvation was that the donuts kept themselves properly on the other side of the border.

    No longer. Our most recent trip cross country took us on the interstate through Indiana like that. Tim has set up shop in the rest areas. Next, he’ll probably come to Mankato. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

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    1. The casual reader of that first paragraph is forgiven for thinking that I erroneously believe that Bea Arthur was in a show with Eddy Albert and Eva (Zsa Zsa?) Gabor.

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      1. I admit that the lost episode where Bea Arthur meets Eva Gabor is something I will now have to only imagine. Too bad Granny, Jed Klampet’s mother-in-law never made it back to that area-that would also have been something to see. I believe that both Petticoat Junction and Green Acres took place in Hooterville (in the days before the creation of the food establishment by a related name-just to keep food involved).

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  22. I have been lurking all day on this site, but haven’t been able to post OR eat a donut because I have been trying tofigure out how to post a new topic on the book club page.
    So that you may know, thanks to Anna, I managed to correctly post a new thread (topic) to Blevin’s Bookclub Blog:

    Book suggestions

    The topic is ‘book suggestions’, and hopefully folks can find their way over there at some point to make their ideas for books known to all of us.

    And now for that donut – chocolate cake with chocolate frosting – the one with sprinkles, please : )

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  23. i had richards bakery in the neighborhood and on friday nights we would bang on richards window at 10 11 oclock and tell him we wanted some of those terrible day olds he would be trying to give a way tomorrow and he would stuff a bag so full the dounuts would be squished and then charge us a quarter a bag. and no one ever threw them at each other on the walk home. they were too good and richards kindness was too genuine to taint it with waste. prior to that i had been a eclaire man or maybe a jellyroll with the red raspberry filling but from those fridfay nights over the course of a couple of years i truied them all and found out about almond paste filled stuff, fried cinnamen, bear claws, napolians, kreullers, donuts of all descriptions, raised cake chocolate applesauce.

    today i have whatever the opposite of a sweet tooth is it maks me bloat just to look at it and then i need a nap but in italy and new orleans i am willing to do it with the certain liong walks that will follow in the coming hours. someone pointed out that in italy becauase they use all fresh stuff that the food is not filling in the same way and i would have to agree.

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  24. When I’m in Northfield, a trip out to Fireside Orchards on Highway 19 provides apple cider donuts best snarfed down while wandering through bins of ripe, red, aromatic apples. And, as with Anna, when I’m Up North, a trip to World’s Best Donuts in Grand Marais is mandatory. When I camped in the municipal camp ground with college students years ago I was the World’s Best Leader when I returned early in the morning with bags of fresh donuts. Mm mm good.

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  25. You all are making me hungry. I’m with Steve- thinking about them makes me expand. But if I got one it would be glazed with chocolate frosting at the shop in Grand Marais that Anna I think mentioned.

    I’d also like an in-person nook club option that is multi-gender. I’m in an all women’s book club and would like one with men too.

    Never cared for Green Acres or those Petticoat people. I was in love with the dad on The Courtship of Eddie’s Father. And Danno on Hawaii 5-0.

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  26. I have to disagree with Anna about the “World’s best Donuts” in Grand Marais. The last time I had them, about 3 years ago, they were greasy and the chocolate was not very chocolatey- just overly sugary. But years ago they used to be okay.

    Best donuts for me are chocolate-covered from Palm’s Bakery in St. Louis Park (sadly out of business now). I grew up on them during high school. That was my lunch most school days- just around the corner from SLP Sr. High, and where my future wife worked for many years during jr- and sr high school. But I didn’t meet her until our senior year.

    Tobies are darn good, too. But I’m really a sucker for eclairs. The best I’ve ever had are in a bakery called Poundcakes in Bartlett, IL. Lat time I was there was well over five years ago, and I hope they are still in business.

    My ultimate weakness is for caramel nut rolls or cinnamon rolls. I’ve always had a soft spot in my heart for Cinnabons (can’t have too much butter or too much cinnamon!). My mom’s pecan caramel cinnamon rolls were always the best, and I’ve found a coffee shop here in Owatonna that makes ’em just like Mom used to- Custom Coffee on Cedar Ave. in beautiful downtown Owatonna.

    So, next time anyone is heading down I-35 south and you need a break, stop in and have a trip down memory lane with a roll and a cuppa jo. 3 doors south of Rose St. on Cedar, west side of street. A cozy little place where I stop about once a week, do some writing, some reminiscing, and stare at the Van Gogh print on the wall- “Cafe at Arles” (Paraphrasing the title).

    Chris in Owatonna
    *and NO, they didn’t pay me to mention them. 😉

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