Home Run Donuts knocks it out of the park

Editor’s note: This is an occasional series highlighting roadside food trailers in the Tri-State area.

It’s barely 8:30 a.m. on the Friday of Fourth of July weekend near Huyetts Crossroads.

Sitting on the corner where a produce stand stood for many years is a silver food truck emblazoned with the name of the business, Home Run Donuts.

Inside the cramped space are husband-wife business owners Fawn and Matthew Strite and their 13-year-old son, Dawson. There’s barely room for a large fryer, some counter space and a proofer. With three, they’ve reached the limit of how many people can fit in the trailer.

The rising temperature doesn’t keep the customers at bay.

“We were just slammed a few minutes ago,” Fawn Strite said as she started to get ready for another wave.

Matthew picked up a 5-gallon bucket whose top was being pushed up with dough ready to be made into doughnuts. He threw a handful of flour on the work surface before dumping out the purple dough. As it hit the flour, the wind picked up, carrying the scent of the blueberries in the dough outside the trailer doors.

In a spot above the countertop is a round doughnut cutter that has several cutters attached to a wheel with a handle through the center. Matthew shifted his hip toward the counter, pushed the cutter into the dough and pulled it through the top, repeating in rows until he ran out of dough.

Then he knocked the holes off to the side before placing the raw doughnut-shaped dough onto a screen to be placed in the proofer. When the proofer’s layers are filled, he closes it. Soon, the doughnuts will rise and it will be Dawson’s turn to work.

His dad placed the proofed doughnuts into oil heated to 375 degrees. With a wooden spoon and a long wooden stick, Dawson kept an eye on the doughnuts, making sure they got brown enough before using the wooden dowels to flip the doughnuts in the fryer.

Soon, people were back at the window. The line was already six people deep as more people pulled into the gravel parking lot. Fawn called out which of the staple doughnuts she needed — glazed, cinnamon-sugar, Blazin’ Blueberry or chocolate-dipped. Sometimes there was a need for the two specials of the week — rectangular confections filled with strawberry cream and round, salted-caramel doughnuts.

As the customers placed their orders, each doughnut was flavored in one of the silver bins for sugar or one of the slow cookers that kept the caramel and chocolate melted. The blueberries are already part of the Blazin’ Blueberry dough, so no additions are necessary for those creations.

What’s notable about Home Run Donuts’ doughnuts is they’re twice the size of average ones.

John Lewis of Hagerstown has stopped by Home Run Donuts four times since the trailer opened April 1. His visits are limited because the trailer is only open Tuesdays and Fridays.

Lewis, whose favorite flavors is glazed, said what he loves about the doughnuts are the size and quality.

“It’s a good-tasting doughnut,” he said, adding that he likes the texture. “It’s not real gummy.”

Making of Home Run Donuts

Fawn and Matthew Strite wanted a change.

“We had talked about opening up a barbecue trailer a few years ago,” said Fawn, 33. “And we always wanted to work together, my husband and I.”

Matthew’s uncle, Carl Strite, runs Strite’s Donuts in Harrisonburg, Va., and also operates a doughnut food trailer.

“We thought, ‘Why don’t we do doughnuts instead of barbecue?’” she said.

Carl Strite trained Fawn and Matthew on how to make the doughnuts and create their recipe.

“It’s a secret,” she said.

In the fall of 2015, Fawn and Matthew purchased the trailer, but waited until spring 2016 to launch their business.

They quit their jobs — Fawn was a promotional model and Matthew worked at a warehouse for years and was doing construction — to devote their time to Home Run Donuts.

For Matthew, 34, opening a business was in his blood.

“I grew up on a dairy farm,” he said. “Small business ran in the family and it was in the food industry.”

They said they found the perfect spot, where a produce stand used to be across from Crossroad Liquors. Matthew’s uncle is married to the granddaughter of the plot’s owner.

“We got permission pretty easily,” Fawn said with a laugh.

Matthew said transitioning to self-employment wasn’t too difficult.

“Well, at least I get to work with my wife,” he said. “It wasn’t bad, really. It was more of the fear of how it was going to work out. ... Everything went pretty smooth.”

The job requires dedication. The Strites arrive between 3:30 and 4 a.m. to make the dough and get ready for the first wave of customers. Fawn said the business has been busiest this summer between 7:30 and 9 a.m. But the Friday before the Fourth of July, every 30 minutes, the line grew to at least four or five people.

Single doughnuts cost $1.25; a dozen sell for $12. They’re also sold in half-dozen groupings and as doughnut holes.

Fawn said they usually sell about 70 dozen doughnuts on Fridays, but during the school year, they’ve sold up to 100 dozen.

In addition to their staple doughnuts, Home Run Donuts offers two new weekly flavor specials. The strawberry cream cheese-filled and salted-caramel varieties were the specials that particular week, and Matthew said peanut butter-filled and raspberry-filled would be on the menu at another time.

“We do try to mix it up every week to make everyone happy,” he said.

Fawn said their customers have been asking about when they’re going to open a doughnut shop.

“We like this right now,” she said. “Everyone keeps asking us to open a storefront, but we like the simplicity of opening a trailer.”