Olsen's Bake Shop

Readers, I have not been totally honest with you. I told you that Skouson Skitchen was becoming a foodie blog, but what I didn't tell you was that it is also becoming a travel blog. Sort of. A foodie travel blog. Kind of like Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives, but with more children. Or at least I assume so. I've never actually watched Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives.

...Anyway! Today was the first day of our trip to Utah. We stopped at three different doughnut places, which I will report on in three separate posts. Number one on the list is Olsen's Bake Shop in Omaha, Nebraska, which we visited approximately five minutes after it opened. We could smell the baking all the way down the street. The shop has been owned by the same family since 1942; one of the women who works there is over 80 years old.

I should briefly explain the rating system. Sandra created it so that we rate the doughnuts on their flavor, texture, freshness, and appearance and the restaurants on their aura/general feeling, aesthetic, service, cleanliness, and overall doughnut quality. She made a fancy chart that we fill out (although we've been using it slightly differently than she intended. But it's basically the same):

Sandra spells "donut" the short way. I sometimes do too, but I'm trying to stay consistent for the sake of the blog, so doughnut it is.

Now for our official overall scores for Olsen's Bake Shop:

Average Doughnut Score: 11.8/15

Average Restaurant Score: 21.4/30

Aaaand pictures!

This is our whole family standing outside the shop. You can see people in the doorway. They are not going through the door. They are the end of the line. This is evidently a very popular donut place.

This picture makes wonderful use of foreground, middle ground and background. It's too bad we all look really strange.

Sandra looks really excited about these doughnuts. Amelia looks like her nose itches.

Mmm. Those are some beautiful doughnuts.

We bought seven doughnuts from Olsen's: a cruller, a chocolate-covered cream-filled doughnut, a kolach (which I thought was spelled "colache" until just now), a blueberry cake doughnut, and three Danishes (lemon, cherry, and apricot). The highest-scoring one was the cream-filled, at 12.5/15; the lowest-scoring was the cake doughnut, at 10.3/15.

Comments that are either really insightful or really funny or both because you can't make an insightful comment about a doughnut without being funny (also, I'm paraphrasing unless I use quotation marks):

Cruller:

Mom's/Amy's Take: It has kind of an eggy aftertaste. But maybe doughnuts aren't supposed to have an aftertaste because as soon as you finish one, you move on to another one.

Cream-filled:

Sandra's Take: The chocolate glaze wasn't glossy enough.

Mom's/Amy's Take: "Tastes a little metallic."

Apricot Danish:

Mom's/Amy's Take: "Scrummy." She is apparently quoting the Great British Baking Show.

Amelia's Take: "Squishy."

Kolach:

Amelia's Take: "I think this is pie filling. That doesn't mean it doesn't taste good, though. . . .It looked kind of like it was filled with blood instead of cherries."

Cherry Danish:

Lucy's Take: "Delicious, yummy, and six."

Mom's/Amy's Take: I didn't really like the frosting flavor.

Lemon Danish:

Amelia's Take:"It looks like a doughnut, it looks like it tastes good, but it still looks like a hot dog."

Dad's Take: "It tasted like Snack Pack."

Everyone Else's Take: It really did look like a hot dog.

Smith has not commented much. I will have to make sure to get his opinion from now on.