Jon Donaire Desserts

Back in the day, Jon Donaire was a regular commercial bakery.  But somewhere along the way, they switched to wholesale, making frozen desserts for foodservice distribution, along with running an outlet store near their home base in southern California.  Yelpers *loved* the outlet, praised the goods, and spoke highly of the ridiculously low prices.

Then Jon Donaire was acquired by Rich Foods, now their major distributor, and they no longer operate the outlet store.  

I was not familiar with the brand until the year of COVID, when I started trying desserts from random establishments, and discovered that many of them were using Jon Donaire.  You may have had their goods and just not known it as well... apparently the cheesecake at Long John Silvers is theirs?

"As a brand under Rich's Products, Jon Donaire crafts the taste of luxury and decadence into traditional desserts, but at an affordable price. The ready-to-serve design allows you to serve customers at a moment's notice, without compromising quality. And because they’re premade, these desserts save time and effort in the kitchen and eliminate the need for specialized or costly equipment.

Jon Donaire products are made with quality ingredients at an affordable price. With their extensive variety of cakes that are beautifully and professionally decorated, Jon Donaire products are a great addition to any establishment. Add a classic, luxuriously rich option to your dessert menu with Jon Donaire desserts."

Anyway. The brand has a few signature items, cheesecake and a "Chocolate Overload" cake, both of which you can find at nearly every delivery generic pizza place around San Francisco.  They also make a number of ice cream cakes.  I can't say I've been impressed with anything I have tried, so after trying a few items, I've moved on, and skip dessert, even though I'm a dessert girl through and through, when I realize somewhere uses Jon Donaire (spoilers are often ... 1) the Jon Donaire boxes near their trash cans or in the coolers or 2) the name 'Chocolate Overload' on their menu).

Tiramisu.

"Two layers of sponge cake soaked in tiramisu flavored sauce are layered with cream and mascarpone cheese, then finished with a dusting cocoa."

My first Jon Donaire product.  From a local pizza place, identified because the boxes were piled up near the trash when I went to use the bathroom.

I actually took one look at this and thought, "well, this isn't going to be remotely authentic!"  I can't say I've seen tiramisu sliced like a traditional cake slice before.  This wasn't the fault of the pizza place I picked it up from, as the folks at Jon Donaire are the ones who sliced it this way, it comes pre-sliced and portioned.

Anyway.  

Yes, it had all the components of traditional tiramisu: layers of cake, soaked in, um "tiramisu flavored sauce", with cream-cream cheese-marscarpone mix between them and on top.  The "tiramisu flavored sauce" I guess meant ... espresso? Amusingly, if you look at the ingredients to figure this out, you'll see ingredient #2 (after heavy cream) is ... "tiramisu syrup", made from high fructose corn syrup and artificial coffee flavor.  So, there you have it.  No real espresso was harmed in the making of this product.  I kinda think it is not actually caffeinated in any way?  It certainly did not have a very good espresso kick to it.

Anyway, it was ... highly mediocre.  The mascarpone layer wasn't all that strong in the mascarpone department.  The cake did soak up the tiramisu sauce, but, it wasn't great either.  Not particularly strong coffee flavor.

Overall, just, mediocre.  I finished it, but, not with any glee.  Would definitely not get again.

**.

Classic Cheesecake.

"Velvety smooth cheesecake on a delicious graham crust."

Undeterred, I went for cheesecake, from a different pizza place, but one that had the Jon Donaire boxes in proud display in their case in front.  Cheesecake is a classic for wholesale, and is something that even a lackluster brand can usually do decently.

But this ... was not good.  Not that I was expecting awesome cheesecake or anything, but, yeah.  Wow.  I dub it "the most boring cheesecake ever".

Consistency wasn't great, not particularly rich nor creamy, and certainly not much cream cheese flavor.  The crust was just graham cracker, pretty cardboard like.  No back crust.

Meh.  Bo-ring.  I didn't want it.

**.

Strawberry Swirl Cheesecake.

"Rich, creamy cheesecake swirled with sweet strawberry puree on a graham crust."

You'd think I'd stop trying their goods, or at least would give up on the cheesecake, but I didn't get this knowing it was Jon Donaire until it was too late.  And yes, from yet another pizza place in San Francisco.

The strawberry swirl cheesecake is the same base cheesecake, just with a swirl on top, strawberry.  It at least looked slightly more "fancy"?

But the cheesecake itself was still the same - not very rich nor creamy, not much cream cheese flavor.  Again no back crust, just the base, and that was just cardboard graham cracker.  Meh meh.

The strawberry swirl was fruity, and not that bad, but, it didn't really make this a compelling cheesecake.  I scraped the top off, and enjoyed it with some whipped cream, sprinkles, and a cookie.

Marginally better than the plain but I surely wouldn't get again. 

**+.