Halloween is time for home-made donuts at our house. For the past three years we have been making cider donuts. This year was my first attempt at raised donuts and I think I'm hooked. These were a lot lighter and airy. They didn't soak up as much oil as the apple cider donuts.
I found this recipe online and I changed it a little so that I could make the dough in my food processor. (You will need to adjust this recipe smaller if you have a 7 or 11 cup food processor.)
Here is the food processor version of the recipe:
1 1/2 c. milk
1/4 c. warm water (105 degrees)
2 tsp. instant yeast
1/2 c. sugar
2 eggs, beaten
5 cups all-purpose flour - approx. 750 grams (I'm sure if you have cake flour, that would even be better)
1 tsp or 9 grams salt
1/3 cup shortening
Oil for frying
Glaze
Gently heat milk on stovetop until smoking slightly, do net let burn or boil. Remove from heat. Add sugar to dissolve. Mix yeast with warm water. Stir and let sit. When milk has cooled a little, add beaten eggs. Make sure your milk is not hot, or little pieces of egg can cook. You can temper the eggs by adding a tablespoon or two of warm milk to the eggs and quickly whisking it in and then add those eggs to the milk mixture. Place flour, salt and shortening into food processor. Mix. Then, with the machine running, add water and yeast mixture and then the milk mixture. Let it mix and knead until smooth. You can add more flour or water as needed. This is a very sticky dough. Be careful not to add too much flour. When the dough is kneaded, transfer into a large greased bowl and cover. (When I cover bread dough, I always put one layer of saran wrap right on the dough, and then another layer on the bowl - this helps the dough to not dry out.) Let rise until double - at least an hour. Mine sat on the counter for probably about 4 or 5 hours (because I was doing a lot of other things) and it was fine. Slide dough onto a floured surface and gently roll to 1/4 - 1/2 inch thick. Cut into donuts approx 3 inches. Do not attempt to re-roll the dough and make more donuts. (I didn't want to waste the extra dough, so I quickly formed some long rolls, let them rise and then baked them to eat our Bratwurst in. - they were good) Place cut donuts on a floured baking sheet. Let rise for 30-40 minutes. (I actually cut out the donuts and then put them in the fridge for an hour or two, then I sat them out for 40 minutes before frying because I wanted our guests to have warm, fresh donuts.) Heat oil to 365-375 degrees. Fry until golden brown - about a minute (less for the donut holes), turning halfway. The donut holes are hard to flip once one side is brown. I found that it is easier to constantly stir them a little as they fry for more even browning. Carefully remove from oil and drain on a cooling rack placed on top of paper towels. Then dip the donuts in the creamy glaze or chocolate glaze. You can then dip them in candy or sprinkles if you want. I haven't tried the chocolate glaze. With the overload of chocolate on Haloween, we just stuck with the creamy glaze.
Creamy Glaze:
1/3 cup butter
2 cups powdered sugar
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
4-6 Tbsp hot water
Heat butter until melted. (I just put it in a bowl and carefully microwaved it). Remove from heat and stir in powdered sugar and vanilla until smooth. Stir in water, 1 Tbsp at a time until reaches desired consistency. I think I made my glaze a little too thick - but there were no complaints.
Chocolate Glaze:
To make the chocolate glaze, it is basically the same as making the creamy glaze, except you melt 4 oz of milk or semi-sweet chocolate chips with the butter in the first step.
*If you don't have a food processor, here is how you mix the dough. You still mix the yeast with the water and scald the milk. Let milk cool until lukewarm, then transfer to your mixing bowl or mixer. Start with your whisk or paddle. Add sugar, salt, shortening, eggs, and yeast mixture. Add 2 cups of flour and mix really well. Then you can change to your kneading hook and gradually add the remaining flour- remember this is sort of a sticky dough.
