Driving through a donut at the Donut Hole in California

The Donut Hole in La Puente, California is a fun little stop for those who love donuts. It is a donut shaped drive-thru shop and bakery.

We often visit family in Southern California and drive around the cities there to see sights. Since the drive back to the San Francisco Bay Area is quite long, we like to bring some snacks with us in the car. On our last visit we decided to get a few donuts to munch on and stopped at a historical donut shop; The Donut Hole.

The Donut Hole is located in La Puente, in Los Angeles County. La Puente is a smallish city with less than 40,000 residents, only about 20 miles (32 kilometres) from downtown Los Angeles. If you are traveling through the I-210 or I-10 freeways you might pass by the Donut Hole pretty close by.

The Donut Hole

The Donut Hole bakery in La Puente was opened in 1963. It was one the five donut hole restaurants at the time but the only one which has survived until now. It was also the only one with donut-shaped architecture. The structure was designed by John Tindall, Ed McCreany and Jesse Hood.

The bakeries went out of business in 1979 and the new owner took over the business in this particular facility only. The Donut Hole has been operational ever since it first opened over 60 years ago.

The programmatic architecture as seen at the Donut Hole became popular in Southern California in the 1920s. Buildings were built to physically resemble their purpose and advertise the business. The Donut Hole is a great example of this, but it is unfortunately only one of the few still left in the area.

Another rare example which is still in use, is the Tail O’ the Pup hot dog stand in West Hollywood. The kiosk is shaped like a hot dog as you probably already guessed. Many of the buildings with pragmatic styles were fruits, coffee pots, tamales and even shoes.

Not too far from The Donut Hole in San Bernardino is a Wigwam Village which also follows this style. It was built in the 1930s and serves as a motel where guests sleep in concrete teepees. We stayed in a wigwam in Arizona and it felt like jumping back in time.

Other newer examples can be found in Las Vegas: the pyramid-shaped Luxor Hotel & Casino, Excalibur Hotel which is a castle and Paris Las Vegas with its Eiffel Tower.

If you visit Palm Springs you can find a life-size dinosaur which serves as a shop. They sell tickets to Cabazon Dinosaur Park and dinosaur related souvenirs.

Visiting the Donut Hole in La Puente

We got our donuts from the Donut Hole on late Saturday morning right before lunch time. There was not much of a line to the bakery, but even if there would have been, it probably would not have taken too long to shop there. You simply just drive in, buy your donuts and drive out.

The Donut Hole is open every day from 5 am. to 9 pm except on Mondays when they close earlier at 7 pm., and Tuesdays when they are closed. But it’s important to know; they only accept cash! I’m glad we happened to have some with us or we would have had to leave empty handed.

Their menu was pretty typical for a donut shop with some regular glazed and frosted donuts, old-fashioned, jam filled donuts, cinnamon rolls and of course, donut holes. The ones we got were tasty, but nothing extraordinary that I would want to go back.

I’m still glad we made this little stop at this iconic spot to experience it and at the same time made our drive back home a little bit sweeter.

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We enjoy checking out these kind of quirky places that are a fun part of California’s history. For example The Original McDonald’s Museum in San Bernardino and Tio’s Tacos in Rialto are quite fun. So are all the quirky places along the Route 66.

If you love street art then you should check out the DTLA’s Arts District in Los Angeles.

Have you been to any of these places or do you have a place with a similar style to recommend?