Hawaii vs Mainland
A malasada is a fried dough ball rolled in sugar. A donut is a glazed ring. The dough is a different recipe and the eating is a different experience.
UPDATED APR 2026
Left side
Hawaii · brought from Madeira / São Miguel by Portuguese sugar-plantation immigrants
An eggy yeast-raised dough ball deep-fried until shatter-crisp on the outside, rolled in granulated sugar while still warm, eaten within fifteen minutes.
Right side
Mainland US · Dutch olykoek lineage — 19th century
Either a yeast-raised ring (yeast donut) or a chemically leavened cake-batter ring (cake donut), fried and finished with glaze, frosting, or filling.
A malasada is a yeast doughnut without a hole, made with eggs and a long proof, fried unsweetened, and rolled in sugar at the door. A donut is whatever the case at Dunkin holds at 7 a.m. — most of which are cake batter, machine-piped, glazed, and engineered to survive a six-hour shelf life. The malasada is a fifteen-minute pastry that loses everything as it sits. The donut is built to last a morning.
Texture is the headline difference. A correctly fried malasada is shatter-crisp on the outside and steamy-pillowy inside, with the sugar coat dissolving on contact with the oil. A cake donut is dense and tender; a yeast donut is springy. None of those textures are the malasada texture. If you’ve only had a Dunkin sugar donut, you have not had a malasada.
A malasada is a fifteen-minute pastry. A donut is a six-hour pastry. That alone explains why most mainland malasadas are bad.
You want shatter-crisp, sugar-coated, fresh-out-of-the-oil pastry. Cook this when you can serve it within fifteen minutes.
You want something that holds for a few hours, has a glaze, and works as a make-ahead breakfast.
Read next
Recipes and guides on the CurtisJ side of the argument.
A troubleshooting guide to the dense malasadas most home cooks end up with: yeast, hydration, oil temperature, and the fixes that actually work.
Hawaii’s beloved Portuguese donuts — pillowy, egg-rich dough fried golden and rolled in sugar while still warm. From Leonard’s Bakery to your kitchen, here’s how to make...
