Cinnamon Sugar Donuts

This week, I continued my new-found love of donut baking with a batch of cinnamon-sugar donuts. Sadly, this recipe was extremely different from the one I'd used previously to make a chocolate cake donut. When I first followed this recipe, I found that it was practically liquid once I'd mixed all the ingredients. I added an addition ¼ cup flour to thicken it up, but it still left an incredibly thin batter.

When I baked the donuts, I did find that they rose quite a bit! I had initially filled the pan practically full since that worked so well last week. Sadly these donuts rose and completely covered the middle hole (and stuck to the ungreased sides of the pan. After my first failed batch, I used less batter (filling the wells about ½ full) for a small, but well formed, donut.

Once the donuts had cooled, I brushed them with butter and then coated with the cinnamon-sugar mixture. The original recipe called for ½ of both sugar and brown sugar, but I found this to be far too much. In my recipe below, I cut the amounts in half (and I believe it will still produce leftovers!) The donuts did look great when I first made them - though after storing them overnight, many of them seemed a soggy, butter mess. Still, my students definitely seemed to enjoy them (but how can you really go wrong with cinnamon, sugar, and butter!?!?


Cinnamon Sugar Donuts
yields about 12 donuts

1¼ c. flour
¾ c. sugar
¾ t. baking powder
¼ t. baking soda
½ t. salt
½ t. cinnamon
1 egg
½ c. plus 2 T. buttermilk*
1 t. vanilla
3 T. butter, melted


Coating:
¼ c. sugar
¼ c. brown sugar
½ T. cinnamon
3 T. butter, melted

*I used a milk/vinegar substitute in place of the buttermilk. (½ c. plus 1½ T. milk with ½ T. vinegar.)

Sift together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon in a large mixing bowl. Combine egg and buttermilk. Melt 3 tablespoons over medium heat until brown and bubbly (the originally recipe stated that it should smell "nutty".) Add the melted butter to the milk/egg mixture. Add the liquid ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix well. Pour into a greased donut pan (filling the pan just slightly over halfway.) Bake at 350°F (178°C) for 9-12 minutes. Allow to cool in pan. Combine the dry ingredients for the coating. When completely cooled, brush with melted butter and dip in the sugar/cinnamon.

Chocolate Donuts

I had seen a recipe for baked donuts on Pinterest a few weeks ago, but thought I would merely have to dream about baking donuts since I didn't have a donut baking pan. Imagine my surprise when I was randomly strolling threw Daiso (the Korean version of a dollar store) and discovered the exact pan I wanted (for less than $5!) I thought this was definitely a sign that it was time for me to get in the donut business!

After searching for a few donut recipes (the original recipe called for far too many ingredients I could never find in Korea), I opted for this simply chocolate donut recipe (which was basically just a simple cake recipe.) I didn't really have any problems with the actual baking of the donuts - though my pan was too large to fit inside my small toaster oven, so I had to bend the pan and only use four of the molds (something that wasn't that big of issue since my recipe made eight donuts.) My only piece of advice for baking the donuts is to put the batter into a Ziploc bag and cut one corner to form a make-shift pastry bag. I originally tried spooning the batter into the molds, and that was a messy nightmare!

Unfortunately, after I'd baked the donuts and started washing the dishes, I discovered that I'd accidentally used 2/3 cups cocoa rather than ½ cup! (My ½ c. measuring cup wouldn't fit into the cocoa container, so I had to use the ¼ cup - or at least I thought I had! When I went to wash everything, I discovered that I had used the &frac13 cup instead. I'm hoping the the extra sweet glaze will draw away from any bitterness the extra cocoa might produce.


Chocolate Donuts
(yields about 8 donuts)

1¼ c. flour
½ c. cocoa powder
½ t. baking soda
¼ t. salt
½ c. milk
½ c. brown sugar
1 egg
4 T. butter, melted
2 T. coffee
1 t. vanilla extract

Sugar Glaze (optional)
½ c. powdered sugar
¼ t. vanilla
2-3 T. milk (or water)

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt. In a second bowl, mix the milk, sugar, butter, egg, coffee, and vanilla. In parts, add the liquid mixture into the flour mixture. Stir until well combined. Fill a greased donut pan ¾ full with the mixture. Bake at 325°F (162°C) for 13 minutes (or until firm to the touch.) Allow to cool in the pan and then turn over onto a wire rake. Coat with powdered sugar or a simple glaze. For the glaze, mix all ingredients until very smooth (more milk or water can be added as needed.) Either spoon onto the donuts or dip the tops directly into the glaze.

Applie Pie Muffins

The past few weeks, I have been following a bit of a processed sugar/flour detox - so needless to say, that has cut out my weekly baking. However, I really wanted to bake something special for the women who work in my school's cafeteria, so I thought these Apple Pie Muffins would be perfect. I originally found this recipe on Pinterest a couple years ago and baked them once in the States (or at least I thought I had.) This recipe seemed very different from the muffins I remembered!

The biggest difference was the topping, which basically had the consistency of wet sand (rather than a crumbly texture I remember last time (the way the topping looked in the website's photos!) I was so worried that after mixing the topping, I had to return to my computer just to check that I had correctly copied the recipe (I though maybe it should have been white sugar rather than flour - but it definitely called for flour...) Fortunately, the batter proved to be no problem - or at least no more problem than the trouble of peeling and dicing two apples!

When I baked the muffins, I found the batter did not rise all that much - I definitely recommend filling the tins at least ¾ of the way full. Sadly, the topping did not behave as I remembered with my previous Apple Pie Muffins; this time, the topping basically melted and gave the muffins a darker sugar coating (rather than a crumbly top. Since I was not able to actually taste the muffins (since I'm still observing the no sugar/flour diet), I'm forced to rely on Korean taste buds for this review. My co-workers definitely enjoyed these muffins - though they thought the topping was entirely too sweet (I'm guessing that a Westerner wouldn't have had issue with this.) The cake seemed very moist, and definitely smelled wonderful!

Apple Pie Muffins
yields 18-24 muffins

Topping:
½ c. brown sugar
1/3 c. flour
1 t. cinnamon
2 T. butter, melted

Batter:
2¼ c. flour
1 t. baking soda
½ t. salt
1 egg
1 c. buttermilk (or 1 c. milk plus 1 t. vinegar)
½ c. butter, melted
1 t. vanilla
1½ c. brown sugar
2 c. diced apples (about 2 large apples)

Mix topping ingredients until crumb-like and then set aside. In a separate mixing bowl, whisk together egg, buttermilk, butter, and vanilla. Stir in the brown sugar. Without mixing add the flour, baking soda, salt, and apples. Gently fold the mixture until the ingredients are just combined. Be careful not to overmix! Pour into a paper lined muffin tin and bake 375°F (190°C) for 20 minutes. Remove from oven when muffins are firm to the touch.