JasmineRichelleBakes: Doughnuts For The Win!

So I decided to make some homemade doughnuts, well Nisha wanted doughnuts. I've never made them so I felt like this was a challenge that I was up for. I mean who makes their own doughnuts nowadays. I also thought it would be something cool for other people to make, and doughnuts are so customizable. Here's how they turned out.

Look at this pink glazed doughnut with cute sprinkles. I'm calling this one the Homer J. An homage to Homer Simpson.

I'm calling this one Joy the world, you know the world would be crappy if there were no almond joys. As you can see this doughnut is chocolate glazed with coconut and almond slivers. Yumz

This one is for Nisha, it's just as you can see, chocolate glazed with a ton of sprinkles, I literally used every sprinkle I had. She's special to me, don't tell her that

Lastly I'm calling this one the Glenn Glenn for my dad. He likes Key lime anything, so this one is a chocolate dipped long doughnut topped with graham cracker crumbs, and toasted coconut. Then stuffed with a Key lime curd. Amazing

I think doughnuts are cool and if you want to try this recipe you can totally customize these, and you probably have all the ingredients in your home already. Well you probably don't have the yeast but you can buy this anywhere for about 99 cents.

Here's what you will need

Doughnut Dough

2 cups all purpose flour
3/4 cup of milk
1/4 cup of granulated sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon of instant dry yeast
1/4 teaspoon of salt
2 eggs
1/2 cup of butter (1 stick)

Additional items

1 large greased bowl (use like vegetable oil or cooking spray)
small pot or saucepan
wooden spoon or spatula

First you need to pour your milk in a saucepan with one stick of butter and place it on your stove top. I had the temperature on medium to high heat. Just stand there it took a few minutes, you don't want this to boil or simmer, just melt together.

When your butter and milk combine together take it off the heat and let cool for a few minutes.

While that is cooling for a few minutes, now is a good time to separate those eggs. You only need the egg yolks for this recipe. You can save those egg whites for something else, I honestly put mine in a glass bowl and placed them in the back of my fridge for macarons.

Ok, now in a large bowl place your flour, yeast, sugar, and salt together

Now mix the buttery milk and the yolks into your flour mixture. This will make a very wet dough, almost a batter. ( I took a pic before I added the yolks, I was zoning out)

So I just added the egg yolks after this stage and yeah, back on track

This is the fun part, hahaha I like playing in food. Hold the bowl steady with one hand and then with your free hand, grab the dough and pull up as much dough as you can then let it go. Keep doing that for about 5 minutes. Your hands will get dirty, but it's so fun. Your dough will be liquid or loose at first, it's going to firm up a little and become stretchy.

Ok now oil a second large bowl and place your dough in it. You need to spray some plastic wrap with cooking spray and place that on top of the bowl. Then chill this for at least 4 hours or until it is firm. I think it's better to chill overnight, thats why I make the dough the night before. BTW, this dough won't double in size like bread dough usually does.

You also might want to prep two large baking trays, just line them with parchment paper.

Now put flour on your counter and turn the dough out of the bowl onto your counter. You can cut your dough in half, and place that half in the fridge to stay cold. It's time to make some doughnut shapes.

I basically just rolled this dough out to about 1/2 inch thick and used a large circle cookie cutter and stamped out these circles, then used the smallest cookie cutter I had and cut out the middle.

Hey if you don't have cookie cutters then don't get sad, you can still make cute doughnuts. Roll your dough out into a 9in x 5 in rectangle and cut 1 inch strips across. Then just pinch the ends of 2 pieces together, then twist into a rope. Then just pinch the other end together. This will make a cute long doughnut.

You can also take the twisted rope doughnuts and pinch the ends together and make a circular twist, it's up to you.

Ok, you are done shaping your doughnut babies. Just lift them up and place them on your baking sheets that are lined with parchment paper. Use two trays because this will give the dough plenty or room to rise. Cover these loosely with a dish towel or oiled plastic wrap. Leave these in a warm place to proof for about 30 minutes to 1 hour.

When you see the dough is growing nicely you can go ahead and preheat the oven to 375F.

So your dough is ready to bake when it has grown by about 75%. If you push the side of one doughnut and your finger leaves and indent, it's ready.

Bake in your 375F oven for about 10-12 minutes, or until they are dark golden brown.

Here's what you need for the glaze

Doughnut glaze

1 2/3 cups powdered sugar
5 tablespoons of milk
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
pink gel food coloring (optional)
2 tablespoon cocoa powder (optional for chocolate glaze)
sprinkles

To make the glaze, sift the powdered sugar into a bowl. then gradually mix in the milk and vanilla extract. Mix until smooth and fairly runny. Now you can add in your pink food coloring.

If you are making the chocolate glaze just sift in the cocoa powder and powdered sugar together, then add the milk and mix until smooth

Spoon icing over doughnuts or dip doughnuts in the icing. Decorate how you please.