Seaside Donuts Bakery — Restaurant in Newport Beach

This past Saturday my daughter and I went to grab coffee and donuts from this store. We are from the other side of the country and found this place based on reviews. There were 2 other gentlemen in this small space as I was ordering. The next thing I hear was a cracking sound. One of the gentlemen had fallen and hit his head on the floor. I rushed to the guy as did the other gentleman (who was also not associated with this man). The man started going into a seizure. I got the guy rolled over to his side while the other gentleman called 911. What did all the women working behind the counter do? Told my daughter to step over the guy to pay. Then they tried to get the next customers behind us to come in and order over the guy who was convulsing on the ground in front of their display. I ended up paying after the guy was done convulsing while I was kneeling on the floor over him. After the fire department came to evaluate the gentleman who had blood on the back of his head from hitting the ground we were able to leave. When we got outside and opened the bag, the item I ordered but paid for was not even in there. The lack of compassion and urgency to help the customer who was hurt in their small space and instead urgency to push the sale through from myself, along with the other gentleman assisting with the medical emergency and then trying to get other customers to come in and step over the convulsing man...

Seaside Donuts has found itself a new fame (or infamy) with its recent resurgence in social media, this time nationwide. So much so that my cousins visiting from Oregon asked to go here the first night they arrived. If you look at it outside the memes, it’s really just a normal donut shop. Because it’s always open, people tend to end up here when they have nothing else to do but still wanna hang out. That fact and the bakery’s prime location next to the pier is really the secret to why it’s been popular with OC natives. The bakery’s greatest support system, its clientele, is also its Achilles heel, as the viral trend attracts rowdy youth that think they are funny and disrupt would-be donut enjoyers with their loud antics and stupid interview questions. They’re so annoying that the bakery has had to put up signs telling them to shut up as to not disturb surrounding businesses and beach goers. If you can overlook the riff-raff, the bakery is a relatively decent option for a late night snack, featuring cult favorites such as the ham and cheese croissant and green Thai tea. The ham and cheese is warm, melty, and comforting against the cold night and the green Thai tea is surprisingly good. The staff work late and genuinely hard, so please support their business. If you can get here relatively early in the night, it’s not too busy and you may be able to snag a croissant before the...

“If love, regret, and butter had a child, it would be a Seaside ham & cheese croissant.”

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Review: Michelin stars? No. But if you judge a place by the glow of its donut case at 3AM, Seaside Donuts is a 12-star general.

This isn’t fine dining — it’s perfect dining when your feet are sandy, your friends are loud, and your soul needs flaky carbs more than therapy.

The ham and cheese croissant? Flaky. Buttery. Melty. Salty-sweet in all the right ways. The kind of pastry that makes you close your eyes, tilt your head back, and whisper, “damn.”

And the Thai tea? Orange like a desert sunset, sweet like your first crush, and cold enough to slap the regret out of your mouth. If this drink was a person, it’d be the one that saves your night and then ghosted you in the morning.

This place is a late-night rite of passage. People from all walks drift in — surfers, night-shift workers, wide-eyed wanderers. And for a brief moment, everyone’s equal under the fluorescent glow of donut heaven.

Why go? Because life is short, and this ham & cheese croissant is flaky perfection. Because Thai tea can still surprise you. Because some places just get it right — no frills, no filters, just flavor.

Go. Go late. Go with your friends. Go when the world feels weird. Just...