Waking up early may be a little easier because the smell of fresh fried dough and rich frosting will be wafting through the streets more often.

A sure sign of a new trend, doughnut shops are popping up all around the city. With the Doughnut Vault, 400 N. Franklin St., which opened last April; Do-Rite Donuts, 50 W. Randolph St., which opened Feb. 23; and Glazed and Infused, slated to open in the West Loop in mid-March, Chicagoans have plenty of sweet treats in which to indulge.

“There are foods out there that are timeless, and doughnuts are making a comeback,” said Francis Brennan, chef and co-owner of Do-Rite Donuts. “A lot of the shops are trying to bring the small bakery mentality back to a simple food product.”

Brennan and his fellow chef and co-owner Jeff Mahin have developed 50 flavors of fluffy, fried dough that will rotate throughout the week at their tiny storefront attached to Petterino’s restaurant.

Brennan said he appreciates the standing room-only location because it allows him to create small batches of approximately 24–36 doughnuts at a time. Each hour a new batch of doughnuts is made and the old ones are thrown out. Do-Rite also blends a special type of coffee made by Dark Matter, a local coffee company, that Brennan said has just the right amount of sweetness and bitterness to complement the doughnuts.

The most popular doughnut has been the bacon cruller, one of the glazed variety with an egg-like taste, crispy texture and topped with candied morsels of bacon. Hopping on another popular trend, there is a gluten-free option—a cinnamon-sugar, apple cider-infused doughnut.

“Most of my experience has been in fine dining, so it’s quite different,” said Brennan, who was previously in charge of the bread program at Lincoln Park restaurant L20. “But it’s fun and refreshing. We only serve two products really—coffee and donuts—so it’s nice to focus on a smaller menu.”

The Doughnut Vault in River North shares a similar baking ethos and is housed in an even smaller location, tucked adjacent to its partner business Gilt Bar. Manager Julie Szmyd begins baking as early as 6:30 a.m. and works until the doughnuts sell out.

Szmyd said Chef Brendan Sodikoff, who started The Doughnut Vault, wanted to create a high-quality doughnut shop for the city because the only place exclusively serving the fried breakfast treat was Dunkin’ Donuts. The Vault is busiest on Saturdays, when the line reaches out the door and around the corner. She said the average time it takes for doughnuts to sell out is between two and six hours.

Like Do-Rite, every day there is a new flavor for customers to taste. Some of the popular selections include glazed chestnut doughnuts and mocha-glazed doughnuts with cocoa nibs.

“The flavors are mostly based off of wanting to do traditional doughnuts and keeping a minimal menu,” Szmyd said. “People become quite loyal to their favorite flavor.”

John T. Edge, “United Tastes” columnist for the New York Times, said the trend of quality doughnut making has been on the rise for almost a decade, coinciding with the popularity of other iconic American foods.

He said restaurateurs and chefs are applying the craft of fine foods to making simpler cuisine like doughnuts, and in order to have a strong technique, the history and regional variations must be known.

“The trend has been toward a better doughnut,” Edge said. “This interest in doing simple foods really well isn’t about gourmet fetishism; rather, it’s about this traditional part of Americans that our totemic foods are worthy of artisanal ingredients and well-honed techniques.”

For a yeast doughnut to be good, it must have a short time between the fryer and the mouth, he said. In the case of cake doughnuts, fresh ingredients are key. Because doughnuts are essentially becoming the new cupcake in terms of pastry trends, Edge said only those who take the time and effort with their fried craft will succeed.

As for Chicago’s sudden surge of doughnut shops, Edge said the popularity makes sense, given the city’s history.

“Doughnuts are a working class indulgence,” he said. “[They] fit the endemics of a city like Chicago, which takes great pride in its working class ethic and industry.”

Do-Rite Donuts is open weekdays at 6:30 a.m. and closes when doughnuts sell out. Prices range from $1.75–$2.75 per doughnut. The Doughnut Vault is open Tuesday–Friday at 8:30 a.m. and Saturday at 9:30 a.m. and closes when doughnuts sell out. Prices range from $2–$3 per doughnut.