The Man Who Wins New England Autumn

Today I learned of a hero, engaged in a Great Work that is clearly a service to all humanity. Oh, and there were donuts, too.

Autumn in New England

It is once again autumn in New England.

Like last year, we made a pilgrimage to the Berkshires. We stayed at the same friends’ house, though this time with them in residence. We didn’t take many pictures. However, as we were all fully vaccinated and religious about mask use, we managed to keep company with some good friends this time. Mostly we cooked, and talked, and enjoyed the beautiful views.

It’s too early for foliage season, but as it’s apple season, it is also cider donut season.

And here at Chez Weekend: cider, donuts, and especially cider donuts are serious business.

M. Ciderdonuteur

From the paper copy of the venerable Globe today comes the story of a heroic man, engaged in a Great Work. ^[1] Alex Schwartz (of Cambridge, of course) has made it his rather intense hobby to sample every cider donut sold at an orchard or farm store in New England. And people have noticed, e.g., Boston Magazine. ^[2]

Last year he cataloged the pleasures of 30 orchards and farm stands. He has the attitude you might expect toward packaged donuts at the grocery store, or apple cider donut flavored Oreos (“filling tastes like a candle”), or other abominations of that sort. (Don’t even get me started about Dunkin’.) Clearly, his soul is pure.

His Instagram account, @ciderdonuteur ^[3], catalogs both the beauty of New England and a bit of food critique of each item sampled. He’s also created a cider donut map of New England, which people use to plan day trips. It currently has 191 spots, each in the process of being reviewed for the 2021 season.

Last year’s winner (and this year’s front-runner) was Russell Orchards of Ipswich, up on Cape Ann. Now I have to see about persuading the Weekend Editrix into an autumnal sightseeing drive that just so happens to go through the noble environs of Ipswich.

And I wonder if M. Ciderdonuteur needs an intern? I could do statistics for him, in exchange for tagging along on a couple donut safaris… in my dreams.

---

Notes & References

1: S Annear, “‘Fried nuggets of pure joy’: Cambridge resident is in search of New England’s best apple cider doughnuts”, Boston Globe, 2021-Sep-09. For reasons understood only by those in the newspaper industry, this appeared in the paper copy of the Globe just today. Had I noticed it online, I could have been chasing cider donuts for almost a month already! ↩

2: S Buell, “His Mission: To Map, and Eat, Every Cider Doughnut in New England”, Boston Magazine, 2021-Sep-08. ↩

3: A Schwartz, “ciderdonuteur”, Instagram, retrieved 2021-Oct-05. ↩