Donut Nation

"I always await with an appetite the next volume from the prolific Ellen Brown, whose topics often seem narrow but whose scope is daunting, even when it comes to an item like the donut. For this is not just a book of recipes--and they are all tempting, with names like "Dutch Monkey," "Chocolate Stout" and "Zeppole"--it is also a Baedeker to the myriad donut shops all over America, each thoroughly researched and lovingly described. Brown, who was USA Today's first food editor and now is a weekly columnist for the Providence Journal, has enormous affection for American fare and she writes about it with gusto, as when she describes the nurse-like uniforms of Psycho Donuts in San Jose, CA, where the donuts types are scribbled on prescription pads." --John Mariani, Virtual Gourmet