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.