Baked Cake Doughnuts

Thanks to author Lara Ferroni, author of Doughnuts: Simple and Delicious Recipes to Make at Home for sharing this recipe!

This recipe bakes up just as delicious as the fried version, they’re a bit less guilt-inducing, plus cleanup is much easier. The batter also works beautifully in an electric doughnut maker.

Note: To get the proper doughnut shape when baking cake doughnuts, you need a doughnut pan with a rounded bottom to each cup and a post through the middle. If you don’t have a doughnut pan, you can make the same batter and bake it in a muffin tin for doughnut flavored muffins.

Savvima tried it this way and the results were great! The “muffins” really had a doughnut taste and the texture was moist (not at all dry in the centers as we feared). This recipe yielded (only) 6 donut muffins so you’ll need to either double the recipe or halve the glaze recipe.

We’ve shared the original recipe below, but we made a few modifications based on ingredients on hand when testing the recipe. Our changes are as follows:

• We used ¼ cup regular white flour in place of the whole wheat pastry flour.
• We used only 1/4 tsp. nutmeg.
• We substituted lowfat for whole milk.

Ingredients:

3/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon flour
1/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/3 cup superfine sugar
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons unsalted butter or shortening
1/4 cup whole milk, scalded
1/4 cup plain yogurt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 egg, beaten

Chocolate glaze-
1 1/2 cups confectioners’ sugar
4 tablespoons cocoa powder
2 tablespoons milk or water
2 teaspoons vanilla

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a doughnut pan.
2. Sift the flours and baking powder together into a large bowl or the bowl of a mixer. Whisk in the sugar, nutmeg, and salt. Add the butter and use your fingers to rub it into the dry ingredients as you would in making a pastry crust, until evenly distributed. Add the milk, yogurt, vanilla, and egg and stir until just combined. Do not overmix or your doughnuts may be rubbery.
3. Use a piping bag or spoon to fill each doughnut cup about 3/4 full, making sure the center post is clear. Bake until doughnuts are light golden brown and spring back when touched (if making muffin doughnuts test with a toothpick inserted into the centers), 6 to 10 minutes (muffins may need a few minutes longer). Let cool slightly before removing from the pan.
4. For the glaze: Sift together the sugar and cocoa powder in a medium bowl. Slowly stir in the milk and vanilla, a little at a time, to make a smooth, pourable glaze. Dip donuts into glaze then roll in sprinkles.

Dairy. Yields 6 muffin donuts.

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