The October 2010 Daring Bakers challenge was hosted by Lori of Butter Me Up. Lori chose to challenge DBers to make doughnuts. She used several sources for her recipes including Alton Brown, Nancy Silverton, Kate Neumann and Epicurious.
I know I'm a bit late this month...but it's better late than never right???
When I first read this month's challenge I immediately got excited.
I've been wanting to make donuts and those lovely donut muffins I've been seeing around for a while now. This just gave me the excuse to make them!
Naturally, as will most of the other challenges, I wanted to make several different types of donuts. I didn't get to make as many kinds as I wanted, but I did make a few. So...welcome to donut week!
I made 3 kinds of donuts and will be featuring each one throughout the week.
The first kind of donut I made was blueberry donuts. Whenever I go to Dunkin Donuts I love to get their blueberry cake donut. So I wanted to try to recreate that.
I used the old-fashioned buttermilk cake donut recipe that was provided for us and I added blueberries to it. It was very interesting to work with but they turned out really yummy.
I usually try to find some reason/event to complete my Daring challenges for and this time it was The Hubble's Career Course graduation that inspired my donut making.
Let me tell you...all those Army dudes definitely devoured these donuts.
Let me show you how to make these yummy blueberry donuts. If you would like to see how the other Daring Bakers did completing their donuts, check out the blog roll.
Thanks for the awesome challenge Lori!
Okay. Here we go.
Ingredients for the donuts: all purpose flour, active dry yeast, baking powder, baking soda, granulated sugar, kosher salt, buttermilk, vanilla extract, ground nutmeg, sour cream, eggs (1 whole, 2 yolks) and blueberries (fresh or frozen).
Before we get started you will want to grab a pot or a dutch oven. Fill it with about 3 inches of Canola oil and heat it to 375 degrees F.
Place the sour cream into a stainless steel mixing bowl. Place the bowl over a pot of boiling water. Heat until the sour cream is warm.
Into a large mixing bowl, sift together the salt, flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder and nutmeg.
Make a large well in the center of the sifted dry ingredients and dump the yeast in the center of the well. My well was SO not big enough. You should probably make yours rather large. You will see what I mean in a minute.
Now pour the warm sour cream into the well on top of the yeast.
Into the well, also add the buttermilk, vanilla, whole egg and two egg yolks. Do you see my problem here??
At this point, use one hand to gradually pull the dry ingredients in from the sides of the bowl. Keep mixing until it is well incorporated.
Once the ingredients are all mixing together, gently fold in the blueberries.
Sprinkle a good amount of flour onto your work surface. Don't be afraid of the flour. This dough is sticky. Scrape the dough onto the well foured surface. Flour the top of the dough and press or roll the dough out to about a 1/2 inch thickness. Using a cookie or biscuit cutter, cut out a large circle. Then use a decorating tip or a smaller cookie/biscuit cutter to make a hole in the center of the circle.
Working quickly, place the round shapes into the hot oil. Cook about until brown, this could take anywhere between 20-45 seconds on each side depending on the heat of your oil. You can also toss in the donut holes and cook those as well.
Dry them on a paper towel then allow them to cool.
Once the donuts are dry and cool, grab your powdered sugar and heavy cream. Mix the 2 ingredients together in a shallow bowl to make a glaze. Dip the tops of each donut into the glaze then place (glaze side up) on a cooling rack to dry (make sure you have parchment or wax paper under the cooling rack to catch the dripping glaze). Roll the donut holes through the glaze. Allow to set and dry.
Serve and enjoy!
Blueberry Buttermilk Cake Donuts
Adapted from The Daring Kitchen via Nancy Silverton
Printer Friendly Version
Ingredients:
- 1/4 cup sour cream
- 3 1/4 cup all purpose flour plus extra for dusting surface
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon kosher (flaked) salt (If using table salt, only use ½ teaspoon)
- 1 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1 1/8 teaspoon active dry yeast
- 3/4 cup + 2 tablespoons buttermilk
- 1 large egg
- 2 large egg yolks
- 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- 4 tablespoons heavy cream (or more if needed to make desired consistency glaze)
Directions:
- In a small stainless-steel bowl set over a pot of gently simmering water, heat the sour cream until just warm.
- Heat the oil to 375°F.
- Over a large mixing bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, nutmeg; make a large well in the center. Place the yeast in the well; pour the sour cream over it. Allow it to soften (if using packed fresh yeast), about 1 minute.
- Pour the buttermilk, whole egg, egg yolks, and vanilla extract into the well. Using one hand, gradually draw in the dry ingredients. The mixture should be fairly smooth before you draw in more flour. Mix until it is completely incorporated. The dough will be very sticky. Gently fold in blueberries. Wash and dry your hands and dust them with flour.
- Sift an even layer of flour onto a work surface. Don’t be afraid to use a lot of flour. You don’t want the doughnuts sticking to your counter. Scrape dough out of bowl onto the surface; sift another layer of flour over dough. Working quickly, pat dough into an even 1/2-inch thickness. Dip cutter in flour and, cutting as closely together as possible, cut out the doughnuts and holes. Place holes and doughnuts on a floured surface. Working quickly, gather scraps of dough together, pat into 1/2-inch (12.5 mm) thickness, and cut out remaining doughnuts and holes.
- Drop three to four doughnuts at a time into the hot oil. Once they turn golden brown, turn them and cook the other side. Cooking times may vary; anywhere between 20-45 seconds per side.
- Once cooked, place on a baking sheet covered with paper towels to drain.
- Mix together powdered sugar and heavy cream (adding cream until desired consistency). Press tops of donuts into glaze. Place, glaze side up, on a cooling rack to dry and set.
- Serve and enjoy!
