There’s a new gourmet doughnut shop in downtown Colorado Springs, and Dad’s Donuts is taking things to whole new level. As the newest sister restaurant to Till, Garden of the Gods Cafe & Market, Trainwreck and the Altitude Hospitality Group, Dad’s Donuts pastry chefs have created a 109-layer cronut made of croissant dough and all natural ingredients. The result is light, crispy and exceptional.
“Each one is a labor of love,” says Mitch Yellen, owner of Altitude Restaurant Group. “There’s nothing like this in the city. We’ve spent months getting it exactly right — this is the marriage between a croissant and a donut. They really are special, and people love them.”
Dad’s Donuts will host its grand opening at 7 a.m. on National Donut Day, June 7, 2024.
The team spent about five months developing their version of a cronut. We were able to sample them in a preview this spring, and they are divine. “It is very much an elevated layer pastry,” says Larissa Vendola, former executive chef at Garden of the Gods Cafe & Market, and co-creator of the Dad’s Donuts cronut. “I mean elevated in height and ingredients too.”
It’s a four-day process to create Dad’s Donuts cronuts that involves layering the croissant dough and folding in a European-style butter. Each Dad’s Donuts is made without additives, preservatives or hydrogenated oils. And glazes and toppings are created from real foods, such as a pink glaze made from a real raspberry puree.
Yellen is known for going big with his restaurant concepts. As a doughnut lover, he tasted some similar pastries in Nashville and Florida and decided to bring a similar doughnut to Colorado Springs. As he and his team were brainstorming names, Dad’s Donuts just jumped out at him, and he says creating a place for families to enjoy together is an important part of the Dad’s Donuts mission.
“We’re aiming for the kind of things you learn together and can go out and do together,” he says. “We have sort of an outdoors theme too. We want to bring families back to the way they used to be outside, camping, doing things together.”
That’s something Yellen did not have as a child, and a portion of company profits will be invested into local programs for youth mentoring and support for at-risk teens.
“We want to bring great food and experiences to our city, and create opportunities for young people in our city, for our team to be a family and to discover the power of mentorship and investing in others,” he says. “I wouldn’t be where I am if it hadn’t been for people stepping into a supportive role for me. I had people who took me under their wings, gave me opportunities that changed my life. We want to be deliberate and create that at Dad’s Donuts.”
For Yellen, it’s about family and memories — bringing people together. And he sees an exciting tie between National Donut Day and Father’s Day both taking place within weeks of each other in June.
The Dad’s Donuts menu features 15 signature doughnuts, including a Cinnamon Sugar O.G. Crunch, S’Mores, Pop’s Peanut Butter Crunch, Passion Fruit, The Old Fashioned and more. There will be rotating bakery goods such as Monkey Bread, gluten-free-friendly goodies and possibly other specials. If you ever see a Maple Bacon or Caramel Apple, snatch them up fast.
Learn more about Dad’s Donuts at dadsdonuts.com. And find more great doughnuts all over town in our article Best Doughnuts in Colorado Springs.
