Homemade Baked Donuts (with Frying option)

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Homemade Baked Donuts are delicious, irresistible, and a bit guilt-free donuts. These donuts have a similar taste to that of the ones which are fried and do not need any special donut pan to make them.

What is a doughnut or donut?

Donuts or doughnuts are a favorite treat of most of them and most of you are aware of what it is. A donut is a snack that is made using frying leavened dough. Typically made using flour, water, milk, eggs, sugar, and yeast. 

What are cake donuts?

Cake donuts are quite famous too. Most of the time the cake doughnuts have baking powder or soda instead of yeast. They have a more cakey-like texture. 

Type of doughnuts?

The most common types of donuts are ring doughnuts and filled doughnuts. Both may or may not have a glaze. Glaze can be sugar icing, chocolate, or powdered sugar with cinnamon or spice mix, sprinkles, fruits, nuts, seeds, etc. The donuts can be served plain or are often injected with some fillings. The fillings can be cream, custard, chocolate, fruit fillings, jam, or anything. There are endless possibilities. 

How to enjoy doughnuts?

Doughnuts are best enjoyed hot and with a cup of coffee or hot chocolate. I am not a big fan of donuts though I love the filled ones occasionally and especially the pistachio ones.

My kids love them and look for an excuse to have them. I do not like to buy from the shop as they are laden with too much sugar and fried in not sure how old oil. Though an occasional treat for them is fine.

Earlier when I use to make this doughnut I use to fry them. However, baking them was there in my mind for a long. So finally I decided to give baking a go. Baking makes them guilt-free and is a time saver as you do not need to fry individual pieces. Put in the oven and they are baked in max 12-13 minutes. 

Difference between fried and baked donuts

Of course, fried is fried and nothing can beat the texture and taste. However, baked donuts were quite similar, and believe me I would now never go for the fried ones. As the frying is done in hot oil with direct contact of flour with the oil, the dough puffs up much more and the texture is softer. The baked ones did not puff up much, but they had a soft and fluffy texture. I might make a little loose dough next time and check if they puff up more. 

Below is an old pic of a fried doughnut glazed with chocolate and the second one rolled in sugar and cinnamon.

Verdict of Doughnuts

And you decide how good is depending on if it is enjoyed by your kids and especially if it is their favorite food. They simply love them. My son loves the sugar glazed ones and the younger one loves the chocolate. She even helped me in putting up the chocolate glaze.

My younger one would definitely not eat if it was not good, but both of them enjoyed it thoroughly. I have to stop my daughter from taking more, as she was enjoying them one after the other. 

The other change I would do with baked donuts is to make the holes a bit smaller. As you can see in the fried ones, the holes were hardly seen, the baked ones had a wider. I do not remember if I made a small hole earlier, but definitely going to do that.

Homemade Baked Donuts recipe

The recipe involves mixing flour, sugar, yeast, butter, milk, and water. Let the dough rise until double. Roll it and then cut it to ring or round donuts. Let them rise again. Then bake or fry as needed. Earlier I used to add one egg, but now I have replaced it with one-fourth cup of water.

Sugar Glazed Homemade Baked Donuts

For simple sugar-glazed doughnuts, make a mixture of powdered sugar, water, and vanilla essence. Make a thick glaze or thin as preferred. Dip the doughnuts while they are hot in the sugar glaze and keep them on a wire rack with parchment paper or a tray beneath to catch the droppings. Leave it as is or sprinkle with chocolate or colored vermicelli. One can even color the sugar glaze with the color of your choice.

Cinnamon and sugar donuts 

Make a mixture of powdered sugar and cinnamon. Simply roll the donuts in them when hot. The sugar will stick to it. However many use butter so that sugar and cinnamon mix can stick to it. I do not add it. Cinnamon can be replaced with an allspice or pumpkin spice mixture too.

Chocolate/ Nutella / Custard / Jam filled Donuts

Simply add the desired filling in a piping bag with a nozzle with tip 3 or similar or poke a hole at the bottom. If you are using a nozzle, simply insert it into the bottom of the donut and fill it. If you are only using a piping bag, make a small hole at the bottom of the doughnut and fill it with the required filling.

Few more Snack ideas

• Mini Samosa/Bite Size Mini Samosa
• Khasta Moong Dal Dry Kachori
• Swirl Sourdough Whole Wheat Bread (2 Types Chocolate, & Herbs)
• Zucchini Chocolate Whole Wheat Bread
• Coconut Oil Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Chocolate Oreo Milkshake

Homemade Baked Donuts (with Frying option)

Homemade Baked Donuts are delicious, irresistible, and a bit guilt-free donuts with a similar taste to that of the fried ones.

5 from 1 vote

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Course: Dessert, Snacks

Cuisine: American

Keyword: Kids Food, Sweet

Prep Time: 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time: 12 minutes minutes

Resting Time: 2 hours hours 30 minutes minutes

Author: Renu Agrawal-Dongre

Equipment

• Measuring Spoons
• Measuring Cups
• Oven
• Stand Mixer
• Wok (If Frying)
• Frying Spoon
• Brush for brushing milk
• Medium size bowls
• Spoons

Ingredients

• 2 1/4 Cups – 300 grams All purpose flour/Plain/Maida – Flour measurements differ at times.
• 1 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast
• 3 tablespoons – 40 grams – unsalted butter at room temperature
• 3 tablespoon – 35 grams – sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup – 120 ml – lukewarm milk
• ¼ Cup – 60 ml – Water
• Extra milk for brushing

Sugar glaze

• 1 Cup powdered sugar
• 3 tablespoon water
• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence

Chocolate glaze

• Semi sweet or dark chocolate as desired

Instructions

• In a large bowl sieve flour, salt and yeast
  2 1/4 Cups – 300 grams All purpose flour/Plain/Maida, 1/4 teaspoon salt
  
• Add the sugar
  3 tablespoon – 35 grams – sugar
  
• Add butter roughly cut into small pieces.
  3 tablespoons – 40 grams – unsalted butter at room temperature, 1 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast
  
• Rub the butter into the flour mixture with the help of your hand or mix it in the stand mixer.
  
• Now add water and milk and mix on starting on slow.
  1/2 cup – 120 ml – lukewarm milk, ¼ Cup – 60 ml – Water
• Slowly increase the speed and knead until it forms an elastic dough.
• Once done, transfer the dough to a lightly greased bowl.
• Cover the bowl with a cling wrap or a muslin cloth.
• Let it rise for 1 1/2 – 2 hours until double.
• After it has proved, lace the dough again on a lightly floured surface.
• Punch it to release the air.
• Roll the dough to thickness of about 1-1.5 cm.
• Cut the dough using a cookie cutter as shown below.
  
• One can make small round donuts too. Do not make a hole in them.
  
• Gather the scraps, roll and again cut the remaining doughnuts. I made mini doughnuts from them.
• Place the doughnuts on a lined parchment paper.
  
• Let it again rise for 30-60 minutes.
  

Baking

• For baking the donuts, preheat the oven to 180 Deg C.
• If you need a brown glaze on the top, brush each donuts with milk on the top.
• Bake in a preheated oven for 12-13 minutes max. Do not over bake or they might go hard.

Frying

• If frying, heat oil.
• We need the oil to be medium hot. Like not smoking hot or else the donuts will be raw and burn.
• Test the oil by dropping a small piece of dough. It should come up in a few seconds.
• Now add the doughnuts into the oil and cook on both the sides until golden brown.
• It should take hardly a 45-60 seconds on each side. So keep an eye on them.
• Once done remove them on a paper towel.
• After a minute or so, I rolled some of my doughnuts in Sugar and Cinnamon mixture.
• For some I simply dipped in my homemade ganache and added chocolate sprinklers on top of it.
• Enjoy it hot.
• Glaze
• While the donuts are baking make the glaze.

Sugar Glaze

• Mix the powdered sugar, water and vanilla essence in a bowl.
  1 Cup powdered sugar, 3 tablespoon water, 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
• Make it into a smooth consistency.

Chocolate glaze

• One can use ganache.
• I have simply melted the chocolate and dipped the donuts in it.
  Semi sweet or dark chocolate as desired
  
• Once the donuts are baked, dip each of them in either the sugar or chocolate icing and keep them on a wire rack.
  
• Let them cool for a bit and enjoy.

Notes

Standard US Size Cups and Spoons Used

Tried this recipe?Share your feedback @cookwithrenu_ad or tag #cookwithrenu_ad

Disclaimer: I am not a nutritionist. The nutritional information is provided as a courtesy and is an estimate only. It varies depending upon the product types or brands.

Updates

This recipe was posted on 3rd January 2018. Today 20th Feb 2022 I am updating the recipe for baked option and tweaking a recipe a bit. Added new pics and content.

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