Making Homemade Donuts is Fun – and Addictive

I blame it on Facebook. Every time I looked to the right there was an ad with donuts. So this made me want donuts. I suppose this was the purpose of the ad but it didn’t make me buy whatever the ad was selling – I still don’t know what that was – it made me head into the kitchen to make some homemade donuts. It’s not all that difficult and I was in control of what went into the dough

Homemade donuts are of two varieties; cake donuts and yeast donuts. I wanted the light, airy donut you can only get when dough is allowed to rise. In searching through my cookbooks I settled on a recipe from Making Dough (you can read my review of Making Dough,) It’s a brioche dough and it does require three rises. I cheated on half the batch and the third rise does make a difference. I’ll get in to that in a bit.

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Homemade Donuts

Makes 18 plus donut holes

2/3 cup plus 2 TBS milk
2 TBS active dry yeast (2 packages less 1/4 tsp)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
4 eggs, room temperature
8 TBS unsalted butter, melted
1 1/2 cups bread flour plus more if needed
1/2 cup cake flour
2 1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
2 quarts vegetable oil for frying
powdered sugar and/or cinnamon sugar for dusting
1/2 cup of jam if you choose to fill the donut holes

Heat milk until until it reaches 180° then remove it from the heat and cool it to 115°
Warm the bowl from your stand mixer by running it under hot water.
Pour the milk in the bowl of the stand mixer and add the yeast. Stir it in and let it sit for 2 to 3 minutes.
Add the butter, sugar and eggs until well combined.
Add the flours and salt. and stir until mixed.
Add the dough hook and knead for 10 minutes.
This is a sticky, elastic dough so don’t go adding a lot of extra flour.

Turn the dough into a buttered bowl and let rise for about 2 hours until doubled in size.
Punch down the dough and let rise again – preferably overnight in the refrigerator – or for two more hours until doubled in size.
Punch down the dough and let it rest for 10 minutes.
Cut the dough in half. Set one half aside.

Roll the dough out to about 1/2″ thick. Cut out your donuts. (If you have a donut cutter by all means use that) – I used a 3″ biscuit cutter and a 1″ biscuit cutter
Reroll the scraps and cut out more donuts. When you just have a little left you can either just form circles or cut into thirds, braid and form into a ring.

Set the donuts on a piece of parchment , cover and let rise for two hours or until doubled in size.
In a large, heavy bottomed stockpot heat the oil until it reaches 340°

Carefully drop in the donuts and fry them for about a minute, then turn them over and fry on the other side. They should be nice and golden brown.
Carefully remove to a paper towel covered plate
Repeat with the donut holes.

Fill Those Donut Holes

If you want to fill the donut holes you can either use a cake decorating bag with a tip or you can fill a zip bag and cut a hole in the corner. If you are going to use the zip bag you will have to use a knife to cut a hole in for the jelly.
Insert the tip into the donut hole and gently squeeze to fill with jelly.
Place in a bowl with powdered sugar and toss until well coated with sugar.

Dust the big donuts with powdered sugar or if you prefer cinnamon sugar or some of both.

How Were The Homemade Donuts?

They are donuts. Do you need to ask? OK – there are a number of things that can go wrong with anything you fry. It’s important to remember that oil temperature is very important when frying; too hot and you risk over cooking the exterior while leaving the interior uncooked. If it’s not hot enough you risk making a greasy donut. I kept my oil between 340° and 345° (a thermometer is vital for effective frying) and the donuts came out perfectly. They were cooked all the way through, they were a beautiful color and they were not all greasy.

Rise Time Makes a Difference:

The batch I made the first night which had less rise time was very good but the second batch was better. They were lighter and the nutmeg flavor was slightly more pronounced. I happen to like nutmeg, for those of you that don’t – just don’t add it.

I cut one open so you can see the beautiful crumb.  These donuts also freeze very well. Just pop them in a zip bag and and when you want one pull it out and it will thaw in about three to five minutes. They did need a little sprinkle of powdered sugar but that is not such a bad trade off is it?

I’ll be making these again. They are very, very addictive. The next time I’m going to make a chocolate glaze and add some sprinkles. I love sprinkles – how about you?

Homemade Donuts

Print Recipe

Pin Recipe

light airy donuts made from brioche dough

• Author: Patty@bookscookslooks.com
• Prep Time: 24 hours
• Cook Time: 30 minutes
• Total Time: 24 hours 30 minutes
• Yield: 12 - 16 1x
• Category: Dessert
• Method: frying
• Cuisine: American

Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

• 2/3 cup plus 2 TBS milk
• 2 TBS active dry yeast (2 packages less 1/4 tsp)
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 4 eggs, room temperature
• 8 TBS unsalted butter, melted
• 1 1/2 cups bread flour plus more if needed
• 1/2 cup cake flour
• 2 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
• 2 quarts vegetable oil for frying
• powdered sugar and/or cinnamon sugar for dusting
• 1/2 cup of jelly if you choose to fill the donut holes

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Instructions

• Heat milk until until it reaches 180° then remove it from the heat and cool it to 115°
• Warm the bowl from your stand mixer by running it under hot water.
• Pour the milk in the bowl of the stand mixer and add the yeast. Stir it in and let it sit for 2 to 3 minutes.
• Add the butter, sugar and eggs until well combined.
• Add the flours and salt. and stir until mixed.
• Add the dough hook and knead for 10 minutes.
• This is a sticky, elastic dough so don’t go adding a lot of extra flour.
• Turn the dough into a buttered bowl and let rise for about 2 hours until doubled in size.
• Punch down the dough and let rise again – preferably overnight in the refrigerator – or for two more hours until doubled in size.
• Punch down the dough and let it rest for 10 minutes.
• Cut the dough in half. Set one half aside.
• Roll the dough out to about 1/2″ thick. Cut out your donuts – I used a 3″ biscuit cutter and a 1″ biscuit cutter
• Reroll the scraps and cut out more donuts. When you just have a little left you can either just form circles or cut into thirds, braid and form into a ring.
• Set the donuts on a piece of parchment , cover and let rise for two hours or until doubled in size.
• In a large, heavy bottomed stockpot heat the oil until it reaches 340°
• Carefully drop in the donuts and fry them for about a minute, then turn them over and fry on the other side. They should be nice and golden brown.
• Carefully remove to a paper towel covered plate
• Repeat with the donut holes.
• If you want to fill the donut holes you can either use a cake decorating bag with a tip or you can fill a zip bag and cut a hole in the corner. If you are going to use the zip bag you will have to use a knife to cut a hole in for the jelly.
• Insert the tip into the donut hole and gently squeeze to fill with jelly.
• Place in a bowl with powdered sugar and toss until well coated with sugar.
• Dust the big donuts with powdered sugar or if you prefer cinnamon sugar

Notes

Prep time is listed at 24 hours because the dough is best if it rises overnight in the refrigerator

Keywords: donuts, donut holes, yeast donuts