Hey, it's still April at least...

[gerisullivan]

I've been in email hell for the past month and am just starting to emerge from it. Hey, I can send mail from my domains again, and read mail in the Dread Mac Mail rather than just through the Panix webmail interface. Win. Let's not talk about the astonishingly tedious project of merging and organizing all of the pre-March 9, 2016 mail into the as-yet-incomplete mailbox structure that Mail created when downloading the last month's messages from the server Monday night. Like I said, email hell.

It's not like I've been working on the problem the entire month, or even most of it. More than the usual number and sorts of other priorities kept me limping along with web mail: hospital & related health stuff, life, death, and All That Jazz.... So no one will be surprised to read I've fallen rather far behind.

Which is how I came to read this truly fine email from Sweetwater's a full 12 days after they sent it:

Sweetwater's Donut Mill goes for Guinness World Record Donut

(Kalamazoo, MI) Greg Garner, general manager of Sweetwater's Donut Mill, says, "We need your help!"

The local donut shop has set its sights on obtaining the Guinness World Record for "The Largest Donut Ever Made." Garner says plans call for a glazed donut that will be 15 feet in diameter. He adds, "With a fifteen-foot donut in the record book, it will be a record that will surely stand for decades in that it pushes the boundaries of what is possible to even cook."

Sweetwater's has discussed this with its vendors and has secured appropriate amounts of flour, salt, sugar and yeast. That was relatively easy to do. The real challenge was a way to mix the dough. Working with a local cement factory, plans are set to mix the dough in a cement truck which will be specially cleaned and sterilized for the project. Once mixed, the dough will be dropped in a circular ring onto a specially-crafted plastic liner at the cooking site and covered with a tent to rise under temperature and humidity controlled monitoring. Garner projects it may take up to five days for the dough to rise.

Here is what members of the community can do to help Sweetwater's achieve this goal: Garner says, "We are looking for someone with a large in-ground swimming pool they no longer plan to use where we can cook this donut." Ten days before the dough is prepared, the pool will be chlorinated (to kill bacteria) and drained. A set of stainless steel pipes will be installed to the bottom and connected to a military-size portable gas burner that the U.S. Army Reserve in Battle Creek will loan for the project; it generates more than 36,000 BTUs of flame! The pool will be filled (by commercial tanker truck) with vegetable oil. The oil will be heated for approximately six and a half days at full power until it reaches 375 degrees. A&V Construction, a commercial construction company in Kalamazoo, has generously donated the use of a huge commercial crane to carefully carry the donut held on the plastic lining over the home and then gently lower it into the pool. The crane will stay in place to turn the donut with special chain rigging pre-positioned in the pool to flip the donut after 8 hours cooking and then to extract the fully-cooked donut once it is done to a platform in the volunteer backyard. Immediately, glaze will be applied by power hoses stationed in six strategic locations surrounding the donut.

"So," Garner says, "All we need now is one civic-minded family to donate the use of their family pool to make this happen!"

If you are interested, please contact Greg Garner at Sweetwater's Donut Mill and send along a photo of your pool along with dimensions. The project will also require about 3,000 square feet of additional yard space for set up. And, since it will take a crew about two full days to attend to frying the donut, Garner hopes the family will also be willing to host the cooking crew for two days.

Finally, Sweetwater's is working with the local media for the big event. As soon as this world-record donut is done and recorded for history, the public will be invited to the cooking site to have a taste. It will be cut into three-pound slabs that people can pick up and take home. "It's the only way we can figure how to dispose of it," Garner says, "but, that's part of the fun since thousands of community members will have a chance to share in the fun." Each three-pound donut piece will cost $9.95-a real bargain since it's the equivalent of about a dozen donuts (depending on variety). Left over crumbs will be taken to Milham Park to feed the ducks by pre-school groups.

Each member of the family who donated the use of their pool will receive a "We did it!" t-shirt with the Sweetwater's logo.

Garner says, "We haven't been this excited about a project in a long time. This is going to be great! He adds, "In this case, 'It takes a village to make a donut!'"

Oh, by the way, Happy April Fool's Day from Sweetwater's Donut Mill!"

Open 7 Days a Week 24 Hours a Day!
Sweetwater's Donut Mill
3333 Stadium Drive * Kalamazoo
2138 Sprinkle Road * Kalamazoo
I-94 at Capital Exit * Battle Creek

Sweetwater's sure beat anything I read or heard about on April 1st!

(Note: I corrected a surprising number minor typos in the email, enough that I'm certain I didn't catch them all.)