The donut pan I brought home from my last trip to the US, was immediately put to use when I came home. I really wanted to experiment with baked donuts and see how they compared with the traditional fried version.
Baked donuts naturally turn out slightly different. Fried donuts are usually surprisingly light because of a yeast batter, but the frying aspect makes them pretty heavy on the stomach. The texture of oven baked donuts is a little less fluffy and I find they are somewhat comparable to little cakes. Good thing: you can easily eat two (or three) of them. In my opinion, there’s room for both versions.
This time I chose to use a simple baked donut batter with some lemon and drizzled the cooled-off donuts with natural pink raspberry glaze. So delicious! You can easily make that glaze yourself, by mixing raspberry puree with icing/powdered sugar and a drop of water. The more raspberry puree you use, the darker pink the glaze will be.
I sprinkled half of the donuts with lemon zest and the other half with chopped pistachio nuts. Their pretty green color adds a nice contrast to the pink glaze, but the nuts are just as good for that little extra bite. Perfect combination!
Best thing is that they baked donuts are truly made in no time. If you can’t find a donut pan, you could also try these with a baking pan for mini bundt cakes. In that case you might have to extend the baking time a little.
6 donuts
INGREDIENTS
INSTRUCTIONS
1. Preheat the oven to 380F (190C). Melt the butter in a small pan on low heat and leave to cool a little. Mix the flour with the baking powder, soda, sugar and a pinch of salt in a bowl.
2. Mix the melted butter, egg, milk and lemon juice in a seperate bowl and add this to the dry ingredients. Quickly mix everything together and scoop the batter in the baking pan.
3. Bake the donuts for 10-12 minutes, or until they are golden brown. Leave to cool for 2 minutes, then turn out onto a cooling rack.
4. While the donuts are cooling off, you make the glaze. Puree the berries with a fork or blender and push the puree through a fine mesh sieve to get rid of the seeds. Mix the puree with the powdered sugar and a drop of water. Too thick? Add extra water. Too thin? Add extra sugar. The more sugar you use, the lighter pink the glaze will be.
5. Dip the donuts with their upper side in the glaze or drizzle the glaze over with a spoon. Sprinkle with lemon zest or pistachio nuts.
