I’ve heard a lot of good things about Peterson’s Donut Corner, including their super sized donuts, plentiful selection, and most recently: their addition of cronuts.
So this weekend, Mr. K and I finally made the trip over to Escondido to try out the donuts.
The donut store is open 24 hours and has a wide selection. I immediately liked that they had so many donuts still available when we went at 11 am, since most popular donut shops in San Diego are already out of donuts by this time.
You can’t enter the shop to view the donuts. Instead, you can walk around and peer through the glass windows to get an idea of what is available. Once you’re ready, you go to one of the windows and place your order.
First, the Cronuts. I got three different ones: chocolate, strawberry and maple bacon.
Let’s start with the good. Peterson’s offers 6 flavors of cronuts: chocolate, maple, maple bacon, glazed, strawberry, cinnamon sugar. They are priced at $2.95 which is a little lower than the average price I’ve been seeing. They are probably the easiest cronuts to come by. Not only are they usually available in the mornings, but you can place an order the day before. There’s no restriction on how many you want to reserve. The man I spoke to was really nice and even asked how I wanted the chocolate and strawberry ones decorated.
This was the first cronut I’ve had that is actually squared shaped rather than round. There’s no pastry cream in the middle like the original version, just frosting on top to differentiate the flavors. The donuts were quite crisp and flaky when we first got them, though they tasted mainly of croissant rather than a hybrid of croissant and donuts.
Now onto the bad. The biggest issue I had was that there was an inconsistency in the donuts. The first one I cut into was the maple bacon. When I first got it, I noticed that it was visibly shorter than the other two. Once I cut in, I cold see why. The layers were almost nonexistent and stuck together in one dense lump. The inside tasted neither of croissant or donut and wasn’t very pleasant.
The second one was the strawberry and this was the best one. The layers were light and perfectly formed.
The chocolate was a mix of the maple bacon and the strawberry in terms of consistency. One side was flaky layers, the other side had thicker, dense layers. Not nearly as dense as the maple bacon, but it was not as enjoyable as the strawberry.
The other big issue I had was that these really did not hold up well when eaten again later. All the places advise that they should be consumed soon after it’s made. But all the other versions I’ve tried so far, they still taste pretty good a few hours later. This was not so with Peterson’s version. The difference between when we first got them and later in the evening was pretty drastic and I had a hard time finishing them at all.
I really wanted to love the cronuts here because I had heard such good things and I like how readily available they are at Peterson’s. Perhaps I got mine on a bad day, but overall I was not too impressed.
Of course, we could not leave without getting a few other donuts to try.
Just like I had read and heard, the donuts here are substantially bigger than most donut places.
We got a french cruller, glazed. glazed twist, cinnamon twist and glazed old fashioned. I couldn’t believe how big the twists were!
We also got some donut holes: glazed chocolate cake, cinnamon crumb white cake and regular glazed. The donuts holes were more like donut chunks but I was still happy to see them offered.
We enjoyed the donuts here but had mixed feelings about the cronuts. It’s about a 30 minute drive for us so we probably won’t visit frequently. I wish they were closer, so I could stop in when I get my donut craving, which is usually in the afternoon.
Peterson’s Donut Corner
903 S Escondido Blvd
Escondido, CA 92025
Major Market is aways great (I’ve posted) and the second signal light from the Centre City exit. Belen Bread is between the first and second signal light (they sell bread at almost every Farmers Market, and it’s a bit less in price from the store) and Escondido World Marketplace is a far more interesting Kobey’s https://escondidowm.com/contents/home.aspx They charge admission, aren’t open every day, but the food booths and general atmosphere is really nice. There are a lot of great places on Grand Avenue and it’s a great town.
Ooh, thanks for all the recs. Now I’m excited to find an excuse to go get more donuts and check out Major Market and some of these other spots.
We’re usually up here once a month (to shop at Major Market) and make it a point to stop. A lot aren’t labeled, so sometimes I just ask for something from the menu board (saying I didn’t see it) or just tell them I ‘want the donut on the second shelf, third window’ or walk and point. Everything is pretty much always fresh. I had the ‘Cronut’ (when it was called that) from Paris Baguette and am pretty much done with needing to find those anywhere else. Petersons will close between Christmas and New Year, so don’t plan on going there then.
Thanks for the tip about when it will be closed! I need to find a few more stops around this area to make a more worthwhile trip. I think the Paris Baguette version has been the best one I’ve tried so far in SD.
We were there the day before you guys and got some cronuts and two non-cronuts. this place is just waaaay too far to go for just this. we ended up going to two other places while we were up there to justify our trip, haha.
i thought our cronuts held up well the next day. all three had nice flaky layers, unlike the bad maple one you had. that was pretty sucky.
i like the wide variety of donuts they have. it’s kind of frustrating that it’s not a store you can walk into though.
I was frustrated that you can’t walk in because they don’t label all the donuts so I didn’t know half of what they had. I agree it’s a far drive. Too bad it’s not closer. I like the giant sized donuts
I don’t think their cronuts are the best cronuts in SD, but I do like that I’ve found at least one variety every time we stop at Peterson’s. We usually go for an apple fritter, raised crumb donut, or a couple of cake donuts. I like that the cake donuts toast up nicely the next morning!
It’s not too far from us (being in Poway) and it’s often on our way home from somewhere. If I’m near Escondido, I usually start getting a donut craving!
It’s not really on my path anywhere, which is too bad. I want to try some of the cake donuts next time, they looked really good.