You Need Some Boudin and Beignets for Breakfast from Cajun Donuts II

Even if it never occurred to you to wrap a spicy boudin sausage in sweet, fluffy bread and eat it for breakfast, you may find yourself nodding vigorously at the idea. It’s quite a good idea, and you can make it a reality at Cajun Donuts II in Garland.

While enjoying your boudin pastry, you might close your eyes, mistakenly think you’re in New Orleans and order a beignet. If you do, a friendly employee will fry some up fresh for you, so you might as well let the good times roll.

The shop also offers a better-than-basic array of standard doughnuts. Cake doughnuts and decorated character doughnuts for the kids are customer favorites, while cinnamon-sprinkled doughnuts holes are a must add-on to any order.

You can also get a variety of croissants, breakfast sandwiches and sausage rolls.

Beignets are fried-to-order and piled high with powdered sugar. By nature, beignets are slightly chewy, but these aren’t too heavy, and the golden edges are ever-so-slightly crispy. They’re best eaten fresh out of the fryer, but I found that they traveled pretty well, and the flavor and texture were both still great after a half-hour drive.

Other specialty items include a mouthwatering maple bacon doughnuts and a round kolache roll with sausage, egg and three cheeses.

Order boudin links to go with your doughnuts or beignets, or try the best thing there, a boudin sausage in a kolache bun. Inside the pastry, the sausage casing has been removed, leaving the spicy mix of meat and rice dressing that will wake up your mouth. Visible seasonings in the sausage make it a very spicy bite, tempered by the surrounding soft, sweet bread.

It’s the bread that makes the difference, according to owner Brian Ibert, who grew up in Franklin, Louisiana, on Bayou Teche. Bread made from a family recipe shines in all the best things at the shop.

Ibert arrived in Dallas in the late ‘80s for a career with the Army Air Force Exchange Service. He met his wife, Kye, during his travels with the exchange and they later married and settled in the Dallas area.
The couple opened their first doughnuts shop, Kiss Donuts, in Mesquite in 2002 while Ibert still worked for the exchange. When he retired from the company about 10 years later, the Iberts followed up with a second shop, Cajun Donuts in Wylie. They expanded to a third store with Cajun Donuts II in Garland in 2019.

“My wife’s influence can be found virtually everywhere at our three shops,” Ibert said, including the recipes, which have been fine-tuned over the years with suggestions from long-time employees. But Ibert himself created the dough recipe for the beignets. “It’s an expensive dough, but worth it, especially when they're hot.”

Though he’s now retired from day-to-day operations, Ibert still takes pride in the outstanding service and quality food at his three shops. Good food is even better when served by “people that care,” he said. “It really means something.”

Cajun Donuts II, 850 N. Belt Line Road, Garland. Open from 5 a.m. until noon daily.