A Pop-Tart in a doughnut? It’s a hit at Fountain Valley’s year-old Donut Bar

The last thing Santiago Campa has time for is sleep. In the past couple of weeks, the co-founder of Donut Bar has done interviews with Ryan Seacrest, CBS and ABC, all because of one of his doughnuts.

It’s called the Big Poppa Tart, a rectangular-shaped doughnut that is stuffed with a Pop-Tart and jelly filling. It’s also topped with Pop-Tart bits. The whole thing weighs about a pound and sells for $4.

“Once we do all the interviews and sell all the doughnuts, then it’s time to come back and start rolling out some dough,” said Campa, 40, of Carlsbad. “Not a whole lot of sleep, but I’m not complaining about it. The customers’ smiles are always big and they’re going to continue being big.”

Various news outlets have stopped by Campa’s store, in an unassuming strip mall at in Fountain Valley, to see and order the unique treat. Curious foodies, some from as far away as Ventura, also have made the trip.

The idea for the Big Poppa Tart started last year when the lifestyle blog Thrillist asked Campa to make a one-off doughnut. Stumped, Campa turned to one of his sons, who suggested making a Pop-Tart doughnut.

After multiple attempts at the Donut Bar in downtown San Diego, Campa and his staff found the right balance of pastry and Pop-Tart and debuted it at both stores in January.

“San Diego really loved it, but Orange County flipped out,” Campa said.

Both stores sell about 100 to 150 Big Poppa Tarts per day, but hype about the treat exploded recently after video blog Buzz60 posted an item about it in February.

Co-owner Hector Garcia, who runs the Fountain Valley site’s day-to-day operations, said it also might be due to Instagram posts he made a few weeks ago.

“I don’t know what made it just go crazy,” Campa said.

By 10 a.m. on a recent Tuesday, all the chocolate and strawberry Big Poppa Tarts in Fountain Valley had been sold. But many customers picked up one or a dozen of the other doughnuts the gourmet shop makes daily.

Layla Hansen and Robin Oakey stopped for a few sweets before heading home to Scotts Valley in Northern California.

“We don’t get stuff like this in Scotts Valley and Santa Cruz,” said Hansen, 51. “I love them. It’s a great idea and it’s done well. Some places have doughnuts that are too desserty. This is like a real doughnut like I used to have as a kid.”

Restaurants and motorcycles

Campa said he hadn’t aspired to open a doughnut store until he and his wife, Wendy Bartels, stopped by a shop in Northern California in October 2011.

He came from a culinary background in restaurants for about a decade at Four Seasons and Ritz-Carlton hotels in Southern California and Hawaii. She had experience catering desserts to Hollywood celebrities.

“We both had this passion for sweets, so I said to her, ‘Why don’t we start a doughnut shop together?’” Campa said.

But before going on his doughnut adventure, Campa left the restaurant industry to race motorcycles for about five seasons in the WERA National Challenge Series.

“I won two motorcycle road racing championships in 2009 that I’m so proud of, but that was back when I was probably 20 pounds lighter,” Campa said with a laugh.

After studying the doughnut shop idea, Campa and Bartels opened the San Diego Donut Bar on B Street in March 2013.

“During the first month, we were in the black, but since then we’ve had constant customers and it’s been a good drive,” he said. “There’s been tired and sleepless days, but there’s always a good day at Donut Bar.”

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Expansion to Fountain Valley

As the store’s popularity grew, Campa contemplated opening another.

Opportunity came to his door. Literally.

Garcia, 27, of Costa Mesa, has tried doughnuts from across the country and proclaimed himself the “duke of doughnuts.”

“My dad was a truck driver, so wherever he went across the country, he would always bring back doughnuts because he knew I loved them,” Garcia said. “My favorite still is the Voodoo Doughnut in Portland [Ore.]. I knew I wanted to do something with doughnuts, but I never knew I was going to open a doughnut shop.”

After the Donut Bar in San Diego opened, Garcia visited every weekend he could. He started emailing Campa about opening a store in Orange County.

Campa said it took some convincing for him to greenlight a second Donut Bar, but he came to realize that he and Garcia had a similar passion for doughnuts. On March 29, 2014, the Fountain Valley Donut Bar opened at Talbert Avenue and Newhope Street with about 100 people waiting in line.

“It was the right fit, the right match and the right time, so we did it,” Campa said. “We kind of threw caution to the wind, and it’s worked out really well for the both of us.”

Though he has received dozens of emails from people interested in franchising the business, Campa said he isn’t interested in further growth just yet.

“We’re really cautious in what we’re doing,” he said. “I have no plans to do anything different than what we’re doing right now. There’s a ton of opportunities for us to expand. Fortunately, funding isn’t an issue for us if we want to grow.”

Both locations sell about 2,500 doughnuts daily. Because they make a limited number each night, the shops typically close around noon.

The Big Poppa Tart isn’t Donut Bar’s only specialty turning heads. Customers can phone in orders for the French toast doughnut, and on weekends, people can grab the Vermont maple bacon cinnamon roll doughnut.

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Free anniversary doughnuts Saturday

On Saturday March 28, Donut Bar will celebrate the first anniversary of the Fountain Valley shop and the second anniversary of the San Diego location by giving one free doughnut to each patron – customer’s choice.

Campa said seeing his customers smile with doughnuts in hand means more than turning a profit.

“We’re good. We’re golden. It’s about the smiles now,” he said. “It’s fun whenever a business achieves that pinnacle where you can get back to the fun of it because the baseline is covered. Now this is all just the glaze on the doughnut.”

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Donut Bar

Address: 18011 Newhope St., Fountain Valley

Hours: 7 a.m. to sellout Mondays through Fridays, 8 a.m. to sellout Saturdays and Sundays

Information: (714) 277-3656, donutbarsandiego.com