Whatever happened to the practice of dunking donuts? When I was a kid everyone did it including me except I couldn't be a real dunker because I was too young to drink coffee. I had to use hot Ovaltine to do my dunking. For a kid to drink coffee in those days would be as bad as a kid smoking today.

I have drunk coffee all over but it is rare to see a dunker anymore. I have looked in Dunkin' Donuts, Starbucks, Safeway, and other places, and I don't see any dunkers. Dunkin' Donuts even promotes the practice in their name. Is dunking a lost art from the old days? Has it gone the way of the Edsel? Is it only practiced in New York and other eastern areas?

As recent as an episode of "Seinfeld" from 1991, Kramer mentions seeing baseball great Joe DiMaggio dunking donuts in a donut shop in New York. That city has always been the Mecca of donut dunkers. Coffee (a cup of Joe) and a "sinker," as donuts were called then, and sometimes now, were popular in that town in the late 19th century.

Vaudeville and movie actor Eddie Cantor made dunking popular in his 1931 movie "Palmy Days" and in 1942, Hollywood did a 10 minute film about the proper way to dunk a donut. http://youtube.com/watch?v=f1Ynf8h_9aU&feature=related.That movie is a must for those learning dunking as it covers such important information as the total time a donut should be submerged in the coffee (2 ½ seconds), the proper wrist action needed, the emergence of women dunkers, and the dreaded ill mannered dunker. It is worth your time just to see the clothing styles of 1942.

With Rachel Ray now promoting Dunkin' Donuts, it's time to see some authentic dunkers out there. Forget about Starbucks and their yuppies playing with their computers. Get some Dunkin' Donuts and start dunking! "Black coffee or with cream, dunking is a dream."

Any dunking stories out there? Let's hear them.