Not bad for an idea that started in 2015, when Greiwe was taking classes at Miami University in Oxford.
Four years ago, a friend of his wanted to partner and open a doughnut shop in Oxford, but instead the friend moved to Virginia for a job. In 2017, Greiwe — a West Chester Twp. native — moved back to Cincinnati.
“I thought at that point the doughnut company dream was kind of dead,” he said.
For fun, he hosted doughnut-making parties for friends and family, who liked his product.
“I thought we could do something down here,” he said. “It’s been a long journey to try and get to this point.”
He and his cousin Jack Nowlin operate Starlight out of Nine Giant’s kitchen, and Jack’s girlfriend, Gina Broeker, takes photos of the doughnuts and posts them to Starlight’s Instagram account. The “starlight” portion of the name refers to how a long time ago stars led explorers, and the “lab” part denotes how experimental the company strives to be.
When he’s not working at Nine Giant, Greiwe said the gastropub allows him to make doughnuts after hours or during slower shifts.
“Nine Giant has been great to us,” he said, adding, “Without them we couldn’t do this.”
He and Nowlin have managed to generate five dozen doughnuts in just a few hours. While Greiwe is not a classically trained pastry chef, he has worked at restaurants and bars, including Oxford’s Skipper’s Pub. He said his brother taught him how to cook.
“He showed me it’s a lot of fun to experiment with flavors and to not be afraid to try something new,” he said.
Inspired by Holtman’s Donuts — “They do a really good job at keeping things interesting” — Greiwe said he likes to mix unusual flavors: “I hope people seek us out because the flavors we have are a little off-the-wall some weeks.”
In order to come up with new flavors, Greiwe polls his patrons and references “The Flavor Bible” cookbook.
“I usually start with one kind of flavor,” he said. “This week I want to do hazelnut doughnuts. From there, I’ll look in the book — what other aspects go with that? I’ll see what else goes well with it and if I can put it into the doughnut or on the doughnut as a topping.”
Eventually, Greiwe would like to make savory doughnuts such as a garlic-rosemary doughnut that he could transform into an eggs Benedict sandwich.
“I want to push those boundaries and take it where a doughnut isn’t just something with a sugary glaze with sprinkles on top,” he said. “It can be so many other things. I want to explore different fried-dough cultures around the world.”
By early next year, he hopes to have enough money saved to open a storefront in an up-and-coming Cincinnati neighborhood.
But more importantly, the overwhelming responses Greiwe has received from so-called competitors encourages him to keep going.
“When I was initially getting into this, I thought I would have a lot of pushback from other businesses — ‘Don’t step on our toes.’ But it’s not like that,” he said. “From the people I’ve met, everybody wants to help. They want to see you succeed. They want to give you good, solid advice and help you along the way.”
To find out what flavors Ben Greiwe will be working on next, follow Starlight Doughnut Lab’s Instagram account: www.instagram.com/starlightdoughnutlab.
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