Downtown Donuts does not make maple bars with bacon on top. It does not make blueberry donuts. It does not make donuts with fancy toppings. In fact, it terms of donuts, it serves only one thing: freshly-made, warm mini donuts that comes in a bucket.
And it does it out of the walk-up window you might remember was once Tootsie Ice Cream in Downtown Santa Ana—just look for the pink door under the pink awning.
The smallest order you can get is a half dozen for $3.50. The donuts come either plain or dusted with cinnamon and sugar. Or if you must, you can spring an additional 50-cents for toppings of dark chocolate or caramel.
Downtown Donuts had its grand opening last weekend during Small Business Saturday (complete with a guy in a Homer Simpson mask and beer belly!), and if you remember how teensy the place was when Tootsie doled ice cream from the window, there may be no business smaller in all of Orange County.
Downtown Donuts Mini Donuts, 307 W. 3rd St., Santa Ana. https://www.instagram.com/downtowndonutsdtsa/
Before becoming an award-winning restaurant critic for OC Weekly in 2007, Edwin Goei went by the alias “elmomonster” on his blog Monster Munching, in which he once wrote a whole review in haiku.