Hot Mess Circus Donuts

I got sick of grazing on Easter jelly beans so I thought I should make something out of them to be done with them in one fell swoop.  After much searching I settled on these Jelly Bean Donuts from Melanie Makes.

Oh. My. Word.

What a hot mess they turned out to be.

First, they stuck to the pan and broke apart as a result of the stickage.  Second, the ratio of jelly beans to donut was way way off.  There were more beans than cakey donut!  Third, the jelly beans got so chewy after baking it was almost like eating taffy.  Last of all, they just looked plain ugly.

See.

Hot mess.

I think they look like a circus threw up on them.

Blockette thought they were great.  Mrblocko and I not so much.

Here's what might have went wrong:

First, I made quite a few substitutions.  I had cream in the fridge that needed to be used up so I used that instead of milk.  I also used sour cream instead of yogurt.  This may have made the batter thicker than it should have been.  The thing is that the actual donut part tasted great, so I'm pretty sure these substitutions were not the problem. 

I also don't think these substitutions would have made a difference in the volume of batter.  The donuts on Melanie Makes look the same size as the ones I made, however her recipe states that it makes 12 donuts.  I only got 6.

The substitution that may have caused the biggest problem was the jelly beans.  Her recipe calls for Laffy Taffy Jelly beans.  Mine were some other brand.  Perhaps Laffy Taffy Jelly beans react differently to baking than the brand I used. (I think it was Jolly Rancher flavored Jelly Beans.)

Second, I think the jelly beans may have been better if they had been chopped up in the dough.  Maybe they would have dissolved a little bit more upon baking.

Third, there were just too many jelly beans.  If I were a brave baker, I'd use 1/2 c of jelly beans instead of the 1 c the recipe calls for. 

Let me know if you are bold enough to test out these theories.  I promised my husband that I would NEVER make these donuts again.

Baked Gingerbread Donuts

Oh man. Gingerbread flavored cake donuts? Ngaaaaaaaaa. The moment I saw this recipe over at Pinch of Yum I knew they were going to be super duper yumtastic.

Was I right?  Of course I was.

Who doesn't want a legitimate reason to eat gingerbread for breakfast!  They were so tasty, but very sweet.  Consider yourself warned.

In order to save time in the morning, the night before I combined all the dry ingredients and all the wet ingredients. This way all I had to do was combine the two and pipe the batter into the donut pan.  By the the time the batter was in the pan, the oven was preheated.

Speaking of putting the batter in the pan, I used this trick my friend Julie told me about.  I took a large zip bag and put it inside my large glass measuring cup.  I folded the edges over the rim so it would stay in place.  Then I poured the batter into the bag.  This way, I didn't spill any batter on the zipper closure (or even on the counter) while I was putting the mix into the bag.  Yeah baby! (You rock Julie!)

While the donuts were cooking I made the glaze.  I could eat this glaze by the spoonful.  Ok.  So I did.  It was sinfully scrumptious.  I highly recommend it.  Unless you are diabetic.  Then don't as it is very very very sweet.  No one goes into a diabetic coma on my watch.

I also advise that you wait more than 30 seconds to take the donuts out of the pan.  Give them 5 min to cool in the pan and then another 5 min to cool on a rack.  If you try to take them out too soon they will fight you.  No one wants to fight a donut.  Trust me on this one.

Also, if you dip them into the glaze when they are too warm, they soak up bunches of the glaze.  If the glaze is so yummy, then why is this a bad thing?  Well, it is delicious, but the glaze won't set up nice.  The texture of the donut becomes a bit spongy.  It's a tasty sponge, but the classically hardened glaze is better.  Just have a moderate amount of patience and you will be rewarded. I'll let you have a teaspoon of mine.  It's all I can spare.

Baked Gingerbread Mini Donuts from Pinch of Yum
1 cup flour (I used white whole wheat)
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ginger
pinch of allspice
pinch of cloves
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup brown sugar, divided
1 egg
1/4 cup applesauce (remember fruit = healthy!)
2 tablespoons maple syrup (I used the fake stuff)
3 tablespoons milk, divided
4 tablespoons butter, divided
1/2 cup powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350. Mix all dry ingredients, using 1/4 cup brown sugar and setting the rest aside.
Whisk in moist ingredients, using 1 tablespoon milk and 2 tablespoons melted butter.
Pour batter into a gallon-sized plastic bag and cut the corner off. Pipe the batter into a greased mini-donut pan, filling each donut space about 1/2 full (for me, this was about 22 mini donuts). Bake for about 7-8 minutes. Remove from oven and take each donut out of the pan.

Melt 2 tablespoons butter with 1/4 cup brown sugar in a small saucepan over medium heat. Bring to a boil and boil for about 2 minutes. Add 1 tablespoon milk and bring back to a boil. Add powdered sugar, using the last tablespoon of milk to help thin out the frosting if needed. Keep over low heat (otherwise it will start to crystallize) and dunk each mini donut into the frosting. Frosting should set almost immediately.

Sugar Donut Muffins

These little muffins sure do look cute, and I do love an excuse to use my mini donut pan. What better way than with a recipe called sugar donut muffins from Baking Bites. These muffins were tasty, there was no mistaking that. They just weren't what I was expecting. I thought these treats leaned more toward tasting like a muffin rather than a donut. Muffins are great and all, but they are sort of a bummer when you're expecting a donut.

I thought the donuts were pretty light tasting. I had wanted them to be a bit denser and cakeier. That was probably why I wasn't over the moon after the first bite. I added cinnamon to the sugar and butter coating alleviate some of my disappointment. That helped...enough so that I ate 5 of them in a row. I gave the rest of the batch away to save me from myself.

Will there be a next time with these donuts? Blockette says yes, but I think I will keep searching for a more donut-y tasting recipe to make with my donut shaped pan.

Sugar Donut Muffins from Baking Bites
3/4 cup sugar
1 large egg
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp baking power
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup milk (low fat is fine)
1 tsp vanilla extract

2 tbsp butter, melted
1/2 cup sugar, for rolling

Preheat oven to 350F. Lightly grease a muffin tin with cooking spray or vegetable oil. In a large bowl, beat sugar and egg til light in color. In a small bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, salt and nutmeg. Pour into egg mix and stir to combine. Pour in veg oil, milk and vanilla. Divide batter evenly into 10 muffin cups, filling each about 3/4 full. Bake for 15-18 min, until a tester inserted into the center comes out clean. While muffins baking, melt butter and pour remaining sugar into a small bowl. When muffins done, lightly brush the top of each with melted butter, remove from the pan and roll in sugar. Cool on a wire rack.

Makes 10 muffins.

Is it a Monut or a Duffin?

I got this donut pan and this mini donut pan for Christmas and I finally got around to using them this weekend. See, I think muffins taste best when they are slightly warm from the oven, and I have this thing about sleeping as long as possible, which means no muffins in time for breakfast. Sunday morning I woke up early and was AWAKE. I attempted to will myself back to sleep but I guess these little buggers just wanted to be made. These are baked apple "donuts" from cooks.com. They were good, not "drool on the floor" good, but "I would make these again some day" good. I've made apple muffins before (different recipe that I have since thrown out) in a regular muffin tin before and the muffins were almost slimy in the middle the next day. The surface ratio of the donut shape seemed to work well with this recipe. I guess enough moisture from the apple was able to escape without drying out the cakey part. We had muffins again for breakfast this morning and they were almost as good the second day. (Only almost as good because, they weren't warm out of the oven.)

The donuts muffins didn't rise as much as I had anticipated so they didn't get that nice rounded shape on both sides. I don't know if it was a fault of the recipe or if my baking powder is losing its oomph or maybe I just didn't fill the pan enough. I have a few more donut muffin recipes I'd like to test someday. I should be able to solve the problem with more experimentation.

There is one distinct disadvantage to using the donut pans over the regular muffin tins...it is not a time saver to use the cookie scoops, at least not with a thick batter like the Baked apple donuts. I had to spread out the batter around the part of the pan that forms the hole. Because I had to do that, it was easier to just spoon the batter in. Oh well. Don't fret my little scoopers. I still love you!!!!


BAKED APPLE "DONUTS" from Cooks.com
1 1/2 c. flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 3/4 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 c. sugar
1/3 c. shortening
1 egg, beaten
1/2 c. milk
1 1/2 c. finely diced apples

Sift first 5 ingredients. Add 1/3 c shortening; mix til mix is coarse. Set aside. In another bowl combine egg, milk and diced apples. Add to dry ingredients just until blended. Spoon into 12 greased muffin cups. Bake at 350 for 20-25 min. While donuts are baking, melt 1/2 c butter. Set aside. Combine 1/2 c sugar and 1 t cinnamon. When donuts are done, dip in butter and then in sugar.