The last place I’d expect delicious doughnuts is a bar, but the new breakfast hour at Esquire Lounge is it. Esquire just started offering morning specials: chorizo breakfast burritos and doughnuts.
Yesterday, I ordered both doughnuts on the menu, each $2. With the fresh fried doughnuts, my server gave me silverware, and so for the first time in my life, I knife and forked a doughnut. Since these doughnuts were super messy and piping hot, it was a good idea. The cake part of the doughnut was the same: dense with a soft crumb like banana bread, and the two toppings were glazed and chocolate-frosted. The simple glazed was really good, and the other was out of control with a splash of thick chocolate frosting. More like a deep-fried cake, the best part of these doughnuts were the crackly, crispy edges under the warm icing.
These doughnuts (and the chorizo burrito) are only available for one hour (10 to 11 a.m.) in the mornings, so if you want these new specials, catch the bar’s brekkie hour. Read more about Esquire’s food in Carl’s review of the Downtown Champaign restaurant and bar, and read about 36 doughnuts of Champaign-Urbana in my round-up of half a dozen doughnuts from half a dozen places.
Esquire Lounge
106 N Walnut St
Champaign
10 a.m. to midnight, daily
