Richards Donuts & Pastries
On my nominations for Gusto’s “Best of” list, Jake disagreed with my Best Donut suggestion. He said “Doughnuts: Sweethearts has NOTHING on Richard’s Doughnuts. Those things are like crack.”
Righard’s Donuts are like crack! Not that I’ve had much crack lately…I’m more of a Black Tar kind of guy. I went out of my way Sunday morning to find Richard’s on Hwy 97. I selected a mixed dozen as well as a dozen donut holes.

The donut holes are a steal at $1.75 for a dozen. You can polish off a dozen of these bad boys over a cup of joe. These little nuggets of pure heaven are the closest thing to a Krispy Kreme donut that I’ve ever come across. They just melted in my mouth.
The rest of the donuts were very good. The dough was light and the frostings were perfectly sweetened. Yummy all around. I will agree with Jake, Richard’s has some killer donuts. However, I did pay about twice as much as I did at Sweethearts.
Now that I’ve tried Richard’s, I’ll have to give Sweethearts another go in order to compare more accurately.
Richard’s Donuts & Pastries
61419 S. Hwy 97 Suite T
Bend Oregon 97702
541-385-3310
Bubble Tea
Bubble Tea … sigh. Another fad that I can not endorse, but the wife loves it.
“I took the large straw out of its sheath and plunged it into my blueberry and lavender bubble tea breaking through the thin plastic wrap lid. Placing the straw to my lips I sucked the large Pearl Tapioca balls into my mouth. The squishy balls rolling around in my mouth was an awkward sensation at first but then as my tongue worked them over, the feeling began to grow on me.”
That snippet was taken from my new book on Bend Oregon Restaurants. Its a romantic story of one guys journey from Milan to Minsk that will be on the shelves in the check out line next to the books with the hunky Fabio looking dude on the cover. Reserve your copies today at Amazon.
Bubble Tea is one of the stupidest things you can buy and drink/eat that I have ever heard of. Almost as stupid at edamame. I mean I experimented a little back in college but now that I’m a grown man, I’m done with squishy balls of tapioca in my mouth. That stuff has the consistency of pre-chew bubble gum. I did not like it.
Bubble Tea, Pearl Tea, Boba Tea, whatever. Silly I tells ya. You kids these days with your Bubbles in the Teas. You have green, black, white teas, you have loose leaf, bags, hot, iced and so on. In my day, we had one kind of tea…TEA. It was hot and you drank it. Helped fight off scurvy. You said “I’ll have some tea please” and they brought you some hot water with a tea bag. You didn’t know what it was, you didn’t want to know what it was.
I guess you can say that I’m not a fan. I don’t really care for iced tea unless it has a few shots of Maker’s Mark in it. Seriously, during the Summer there is nothing better than a pint glass filled with ice, then mix half and half of Lipton’s Sweetened Iced Tea and Maker’s Mark bourbon. I call it the Mark Lipton. Sooooo good!!
If you don’t care what I think and still want some Bubble Tea in Bend Oregon you have two options. Townshends by Great Harvest or Balay by Pine Tavern.

