Rhode Island and Massachusetts shores are good places to eat seafood—plain or fancy, fried, broiled, or steamed. In this region, chances are good that the meal will include fried dough. A full shore dinner automatically includes savory clam fritters or clam cakes. A popular alternative, especially around the Narragansett Bay, is doughboys. Resembling New Orleans beignets, but sheathed in crystalline sugar rather than powder, doughboys are made from a yeast-risen dough that is sweet enough to balance the briniest seafood, and they usually are served by the half-dozen. Doughboys always are eaten out of hand. As a snack while strolling along the shore or at a fair, they are a doppelganger for Italian zeppoli.
Doughboys are sold by sixes and dozens.