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Home › Donut Guides › Best Holiday Donuts & Baked Goods in New York City
Best Holiday Donuts & Baked Goods in New York City
New York does the holidays big, from Hanukkah sufganiyot and Italian Christmas cookies to bûche de Noël in SoHo, and our Midtown Holiday Donut Tour tastes the season steps from the Rockefeller Center tree. Here are the holiday treats we send friends to, grouped by neighborhood so you can plan your route.
By the Underground Donut Tour team · Updated November 2026
Looking for year-round favorites? See our Best Donut Shops in New York City guide.
Want to taste the best of New York City with a guide? See our New York City food tours.
MIDTOWN / TIMES SQUARE
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Doughnut Plant at Grand Central
Doughnut Plant brings its square jam doughnuts and pillowy yeast rings right into Grand Central, perfect for a festive commuter treat. Come late fall, the case fills with cranberry and roasted chestnut doughnuts, and Hanukkah brings blackberry jam doughnuts with vanilla bean glaze. Grab a few for the train or a box for the office party.
Donut Tour Recommends: Blackberry jam Hanukkah doughnut (seasonal)
MIDTOWN / TIMES SQUARE
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● Asian-owned
Angelina Bakery
Angelina Bakery fills its Times Square flagship with Italian-style pastries, and the holidays are when it really shines. Look for house panettone in traditional and chocolate pear, plus festive extras like a Christmas tree mousse cake with an orange center. Pair one with a glossy bomboloni and you are set.
Donut Tour Recommends: Chocolate and pear panettone (seasonal)
MIDTOWN / TIMES SQUARE
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Krispy Kreme Times Square
The Times Square flagship is a doughnut theater, with a glaze waterfall and a giant Hot Light glowing over Broadway. Every holiday season the lineup turns festive, with cream-filled Santa Belly doughnuts and chocolate-dipped Holiday Sprinkles. Don't skip the Big Apple doughnut, sold only here.
Donut Tour Recommends: Santa Belly doughnut (seasonal)
MIDTOWN / TIMES SQUARE
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Wafels & Dinges at Bryant Park
Bryant Park, 42nd St & 6th Ave
Wafels & Dinges serves hot Belgian waffles from its Bryant Park kiosk, right in the middle of the twinkling Winter Village. Pile on dulce de leche, Nutella or spekuloos spread, then warm up with a rich Belgian hot cocoa. It's the coziest rinkside snack in Midtown.
Donut Tour Recommends: Belgian wafel with spekuloos and hot cocoa (seasonal)
MIDTOWN / TIMES SQUARE
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Dough Doughnuts Rockefeller Center
Dough makes its giant, fluffy yeast doughnuts in small batches all day, steps from the Rockefeller Center tree. Hanukkah brings sufganiyot in flavors like Nutella, halva and Boston cream, alongside signatures like hibiscus and dulce de leche with toasted almonds. It's a great sweet stop after you see the tree.
Donut Tour Recommends: Halva sufganiyah (seasonal)
UNION SQUARE / GREENWICH VILLAGE
Breads Bakery
Breads Bakery is famous for its glossy chocolate babka, a must-bring for any holiday table. For Hanukkah it fries sufganiyot in strawberry jam, mango, pistachio, vanilla and chocolate. Grab a babka loaf for later and a doughnut for now.
Donut Tour Recommends: Pistachio sufganiyah (seasonal)
UNION SQUARE / GREENWICH VILLAGE
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Unregular Bakery
Unregular Bakery brings Roman bakery energy to Union Square with cream-stuffed bomboloni in flavors like strawberry cheesecake and Nutella. When the weather cools, it takes preorders for seasonal pumpkin, apple and peach pies. Add a mini-croissant-topped Lattini for a fun holiday pick-me-up.
Donut Tour Recommends: Pumpkin pie (seasonal)
UNION SQUARE / GREENWICH VILLAGE
Daily Provisions
Daily Provisions built a fan club on its crisp, eggy maple crullers. Each Hanukkah it turns them into sufganiyot crullers, filled with strawberry jam and rolled in lemon-infused sugar. Preorder a box for the family.
Donut Tour Recommends: Sufganiyot cruller (seasonal)
UNION SQUARE / GREENWICH VILLAGE
Pasticceria Rocco
Rocco's has been a Bleecker Street favorite for generations, with glass cases full of cannoli, sfogliatelle and pignoli cookies. In December it piles up decorated butter Christmas cookies, sold by the pound, by the piece or on a ready-to-gift platter. It's an old-school Italian holiday tradition.
Donut Tour Recommends: Decorated Christmas butter cookie platter (seasonal)
NOHO / EAST VILLAGE
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Il Buco Alimentari & Vineria
Il Buco Alimentari pairs a celebrated trattoria with a bakery counter turning out rustic breads and Italian sweets. Around the holidays it bags biscotti in festive flavors like dried cherry with star anise and walnut, or dark chocolate with pistachio and currant. They make an easy hostess gift.
Donut Tour Recommends: Dried cherry, star anise and walnut biscotti (seasonal)
NOHO / EAST VILLAGE
Veniero's Pasticceria & Caffe
Veniero's has been a holiday ritual in the East Village since 1894, and the December line proves it. Load up an assorted cookie tray with pignoli, rainbow cookies and jelly-filled butter cookies, or take home a rum-soaked Christmas fruitcake. Stay for a cannoli in the old-world café.
Donut Tour Recommends: Italian Christmas cookie tray with rainbow cookies (seasonal)
NOHO / EAST VILLAGE
● Asian-owned
Lady Wong
Lady Wong fills its pastel cases with jewel-toned Southeast Asian kuih and French-style cakes. For the holidays it has offered a chestnut bûche de Noël layered with vanilla mousse, Earl Grey compote and chestnut cream. Add pandan serimuka or onde onde on the side.
Donut Tour Recommends: Chestnut bûche de Noël (seasonal)
NOHO / EAST VILLAGE
Lafayette Grand Café & Bakery
Lafayette's bakery counter is a Parisian-style dream of croissants, tarts and pastel pastries. For the holidays it has made a milk chocolate and pecan bûche de Noël with praline whipped cream and caramel mousse. Preorder one for the centerpiece of your dessert table.
Donut Tour Recommends: Milk chocolate pecan bûche de Noël (seasonal)
SOHO / NOLITA / LOWER EAST SIDE
Dominique Ansel Bakery
The home of the Cronut gets fully festive in December, when the SoHo bakery's holiday bûche de Noël takes center stage. A recent version took its cue from sticky toffee pudding, with salted caramel crémeux, brown sugar ganache and date-filled chocolate sponge. Pick up a flaky DKA while you're there.
Donut Tour Recommends: Holiday bûche de Noël (seasonal)
SOHO / NOLITA / LOWER EAST SIDE
Ferrara Bakery & Cafe
Ferrara has anchored Little Italy since 1892, and the holidays are its time to show off. Pick up honey-drenched struffoli, a tray of Italian cookies, or the giant cannoli filled with dozens of mini cannoli. It's pure Christmas in Little Italy.
Donut Tour Recommends: Struffoli (seasonal)
CHINATOWN / LOWER EAST SIDE
Michaeli Bakery
Michaeli Bakery brings Tel Aviv-style pastries to the edge of Chinatown, and Hanukkah is its busiest week. Sufganiyot come in strawberry jam, dulce de leche, halva, hazelnut, pistachio and more, and it fries Moroccan sfenj too. Come early, because they go fast.
Donut Tour Recommends: Halva cream sufganiyah (seasonal)
CHINATOWN / LOWER EAST SIDE
Elbow Bread
Elbow Bread is a cozy bakery-café known for creative takes on Jewish deli classics. At Hanukkah it fries a classic yeasted pomegranate jelly doughnut and a cornbread cake doughnut with saffron honey butter glaze. Preorder the jelly ones, and walk in for the cornbread rounds.
Donut Tour Recommends: Pomegranate jelly doughnut (seasonal)
UPPER WEST SIDE
Zabar's
Zabar's is an Upper West Side institution with a bakery counter stacked with babka and rugelach. For Hanukkah it keeps things classic, with simple, jam-filled sufganiyot. Add smoked fish and latkes and the whole holiday spread is done.
Donut Tour Recommends: Sufganiyot (seasonal)
UPPER WEST SIDE
Levain Bakery
Levain's six-ounce cookies are an Upper West Side legend, crisp outside and gooey inside. The holiday season brings back its dark chocolate peppermint cookie, plus gift tins and holiday assortments that ship. Grab one warm and eat it on the sidewalk like a local.
Donut Tour Recommends: Dark chocolate peppermint cookie (seasonal)
UPPER EAST SIDE
Orwashers Bakery
Orwashers has baked on East 78th Street since 1916, and its Hanukkah sufganiyot are a neighborhood tradition. Build your own by choosing strawberry, raspberry or cherry-apricot jam and a powdered sugar, sugar or chocolate finish. Blue-and-white cookies and rugelach round out the box.
Donut Tour Recommends: Build-your-own sufganiyah (seasonal)
WILLIAMSBURG / GREENPOINT
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Peter Pan Donut & Pastry Shop
Peter Pan has been frying old-school doughnuts in Greenpoint since the 1950s, served at a classic counter by staff in mint-green uniforms. Its powdered jelly doughnut is a go-to for Hanukkah, and the red velvet and sour cream doughnuts are worth the line any time of year. Bring cash.
Donut Tour Recommends: Powdered jelly doughnut (Hanukkah favorite)
WILLIAMSBURG / GREENPOINT
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Doughnut Plant Williamsburg
Doughnut Plant's Bedford Avenue shop serves the same signature yeast and cake doughnuts that made the brand a cult favorite. For Hanukkah it has rolled out marzipan, pistachio-glazed and blackberry jam doughnuts, plus a giant menorah-shaped doughnut. It's a showstopper for any party.
Donut Tour Recommends: Menorah doughnut (seasonal)
WILLIAMSBURG / GREENPOINT
Fortunato Brothers
Fortunato Brothers is a classic Italian pasticceria in Williamsburg, beloved for cannoli, sfogliatelle and espresso at the old-school counter. At Christmas the cases fill with Italian cookies, including tri-color rainbow cookies, ready to box for the holiday table. Grab a few to eat on the spot too.
Donut Tour Recommends: Rainbow cookies (seasonal)
BED-STUY / BROOKLYN HEIGHTS
● Women-owned ● Latino-owned
Fan-Fan Doughnuts
Fan-Fan turns brioche dough into some of Brooklyn's most inventive filled doughnuts. Its Hanukkah run is a highlight, with flavors like strawberry-sumac jam, chocolate halva, labneh cheesecake with baklava crunch and Persian carrot jam with rose petals. Classic raspberry-verbena is always a winner.
Donut Tour Recommends: Chocolate halva sufganiyah (seasonal)
SOUTH BROOKLYN
Court Pastry Shop
Court Pastry has been a Carroll Gardens fixture for decades, known for crisp cannoli, sfogliatelle and lemon ices. At Christmas, locals line up for boxes of Italian holiday cookies to ship to family or set out for guests. It's a sweet piece of old Brooklyn.
Donut Tour Recommends: Italian Christmas cookie box (seasonal)
SOUTH BROOKLYN
Mike's Donuts
Mike's Donuts has been a Bay Ridge favorite for about 50 years, keeping things classic and affordable. Its glazed jelly-filled doughnut is a neighborhood pick for Hanukkah, and variety boxes come topped with cereal and sprinkles. Grab a baker's dozen for the crowd.
Donut Tour Recommends: Glazed jelly-filled doughnut (Hanukkah favorite)
SOUTH BROOKLYN
Don Paco Lopez Panaderia
Don Paco Lopez is a beloved Sunset Park panaderia with trays of conchas and Mexican sweet breads. In early January it bakes rosca de reyes, the ring-shaped Three Kings bread topped with candied fruit, with a tiny baby figure hidden inside. Grab a cafe de olla to go with it.
Donut Tour Recommends: Rosca de reyes (seasonal)
Taste New York City's best on one walk
Skip the guesswork. Our guides pick the best of the best at each stop, with stories along the way.
Union Square Delicious Donut Tour →
Union Square Choose Your Own Donuts Tour →
East Village Delicious Donut & Pastry Tour →
Times Square Delicious Donut Tour →
Brooklyn Delicious Donut & History Tour →
New York City Donut FAQ
Are these holiday spots ranked?
No. Every bakery and donut shop here is one we would happily send a friend to, so we list them by neighborhood instead of ranking them.
When can I find these holiday treats?
Most holiday specials show up from late November through New Year's, with sufganiyot around Hanukkah and rosca de reyes in early January. Menus change every season, so check each shop's site or social before you go.
Can I taste some of these on a tour?
Yes. Our Midtown Holiday Donut Tour visits Doughnut Plant at Grand Central, Angelina Bakery, Krispy Kreme Times Square, Wafels & Dinges in Bryant Park's Winter Village and Dough near the Rockefeller Center tree. Our other Manhattan and Brooklyn tours stop at Unregular Bakery, Il Buco Alimentari, Peter Pan and Doughnut Plant Williamsburg. Lineups can vary by day and season.
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