You might need both hands to eat a burger doughnut from Horseshoe Donuts. It’s a big one—in size and popularity. “It’s got quite a following,” says Liz Schulze, co-owner of the two-year old business in Monument and near Memorial Park. Teenagers bring parents to try it. Dads and little boys two-fist them together. “It’s the cutest thing,” Schulze says. Some people ask if it’s a real hamburger. In reality, it’s two doughnuts, chocolate cake between two thin glazed. There are other creative confections too: signature pony and horseshoe shapes, giant birthday doughnuts bigger than a dinner plate. And there are brewnuts on Saturdays in the Monument shop, made in partnership with Pikes Peak Brewing—for example, chocolate cake glazed made with Paddy O’ the Peak Irish Stout, topped with stout icing and graham-cracker crust.
Schulze and her identical twin sister, Erin Monyek, learned to bake as teens in their grandparents’ B&B in Gloucester, Massachusetts. With Monyek’s background as an attorney and Schulze’s as CFO of a mobility solutions company, the sisters dreamed of starting a business together, probably a horse or dog rescue. But when they tried locally to continue their ritual of breakfast together at a doughnut shop, they were underwhelmed. They decided it was time to raise the local donut stakes. Call these craft donuts: fresh, handcut, huge—easily the best I’ve had in the region. “Donuts make people happy,” says Monyek, who does the baking. Bring on the doughy delight.
