I tried the ‘best doughnuts in Charlotte.’ Here’s what I got for $25

I had passed Yummm Donut so many times that the storefront no longer registered, just another blur of cement and plate glass between a T-Mobile and a UPS store.

I never stopped. Habit pulled me elsewhere, toward the familiar comfort of wings at Wingstop, or to the relentless spending traps of Starbucks and Costco just steps away.

The Charlotte location opened last year after getting its start in Gastonia, crowned by CharlotteFive readers as the best place for doughnuts.

I wanted to know if the hype was true.

When I finally pulled into the parking lot, I didn’t rush in. I sat in the car, staring at the door. I’d been dieting, constantly counting calories, and I didn’t want to relapse. The prospect of eating a doughnut — sweet, heavy and full of carbs — felt like both temptation and threat.

Inside, the shop greeted me with its brightness: cheerful pink paint on the walls, the air scented with fried dough.

Then I turned the corner after the register and stopped. The glass case stretched in front of me, lit like a stage. Doughnuts the size of fists, layered in glazes and stacked with extravagant toppings: bacon, marshmallows, ribbons of chocolate. Each one seemed almost too elaborate to eat.

But that’s what I did.

Here’s what you need to know about Yummm Donut.

What’s on the menu at Yummm Donut?

The Yummm Donut menu offers an assortment of doughnuts, which can be purchased individually or by the dozen, along with apple fritters, cinnamon rolls and iced coffee.

Menu prices range from $1.69 for individual doughnuts to $26.99 for dozens.

Here’s everything I got for roughly $23 (before tax and tip):

• A half-dozen of all-special doughnuts: Strawberry shortcake, s’more, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, red velvet, maple bacon and jelly-filled ($16.25)
• French vanilla iced coffee ($5.25)

My original plan was to try a bite of each of these doughnuts and review them for anyone reading this.

“There’s no way I could eat six doughnuts by myself,” I thought, knowing full well that I’d consumed at least that many doughnuts on at least eight different occasions.

The strawberry shortcake doughnut was on-deck first. Biting into it, the fluffiness of the dough combined with the sweetness of the strawberry icing and cake crumbles combined to form something marvelous, the kind of dessert that makes you forget, briefly, that it’s breakfast.

Then, something strange happened. The doughnut vanished.

It was as if muscle memory had taken over, forcing my arm to lift the doughnut to my mouth until it was no more, similar to how former smokers reach for cigarettes that aren’t there.

I was already full, but the Cinnamon Toast Crunch doughnut beckoned.

If you grew up in the 2000s, or spent any time around children’s programming, you probably remember the cereal commercials: tiny, anthropomorphized pieces of toast, gleefully chaotic — and occasionally devouring one another — in their breakfast world.

This doughnut captured that same childhood magic. It was cinnamon cereal compressed into cake, its icing like cold milk poured over the crunchy pieces, soaking them through and carrying the sweetness with each bite.

Aside from the doughnuts, the coffee was serviceable. Nobody goes to a doughnut shop for coffee, right?

When is Yummm Donut open?

• Location: 624 Tyvola Rd #104, Charlotte, NC 28217
• Hours: 6 a.m.-6 p.m., Monday-Saturday; 6:30 a.m.-6 p.m. Sundays
• Cuisine: Doughnuts 
• Instagram: @yummmdonut

Evan Moore

The Charlotte Observer

Evan Moore is a service journalism reporter for the Charlotte Observer. He grew up in Denver, North Carolina, where he previously worked as a reporter for the Denver Citizen, and is a UNC Charlotte graduate.