Baked Donuts--Cinnamon Sugar and Powdered Sugar

I have a terrible weakness when it comes to donuts.  Specifically the raised, glazed kind that you can get at the bakery.  But even cake donuts sound appealing to me and those are a kind I can easily make at home.  No deep frying necessary for a delicious flavor.  Some people tout that baked donuts are healthier than their fried counterparts, which may be true, but I'm not entirely sure.  Especially once you dunk the baked donuts into melted butter and then coat them with your favorite topping.  This, of course, is optional, but it sure helps the topping to stick better to your donuts!  Nothing beats waking up to the smell (and taste!) of freshly baked donuts...without all the chemicals and preservatives that the kind at the store have in them.

I have a little donut baking tray that I use to make my donuts.  But, if you don't have one, never fear. You can easily make donut holes/poppers in a mini-muffin pan and wind up with the same tasty results!

Ingredients:

2 c. flour
3/4 c. white sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1 tsp. salt
3/4 c. buttermilk ** (see note below)
2 eggs
1/2 tsp. vanilla
2 Tbsp. butter, melted

**if you don't have buttermilk on hand (either fresh or powdered mixed with water can be used), no sweat.  Simply pour almost 3/4 c. of milk in a measuring cup and add a splash of vinegar.  Stir it a bit, let it sit for a few minutes, and viola, your own soured milk, just like buttermilk!

Toppings:

melted butter in a cereal-size bowl
large Ziploc bag (gallon size) filled with:
   *powdered sugar
            OR
   *sugar/cinnamon mixture.  (You can use either white sugar and cinnamon, or brown sugar and cinnamon.  I love the combination of brown sugar and cinnamon--it's what I always use in my Christmas morning cinnamon rolls--but the white sugar with cinnamon will give your donuts a finer sugary texture.  You can't go wrong either way!)

An additional topping alternative is to make your own powdered sugar icing--as thick or thin as you like it.  Combine powdered sugar with milk, adding more milk for a thin glaze or less milk for a thicker coating where you can sprinkle decorative sugars/candies on top if you so desire.

Oven Temperature: 400 degrees
Baking Time: 8 minutes

In a large bowl, combine dry ingredients and stir.  In a separate bowl, combine all the wet ingredients. If you can't have your eggs and milk come to room temperature prior to making this recipe, make sure you add your melted butter last, after stirring the eggs, milk, and vanilla together first, stirring the entire time you add the butter.  You don't want your butter to turn into a solid again once it hits the colder ingredients.  Once your wet ingredients have been mixed, combine the wet and dry ingredients.  Stir until no dry spots remain.

At this point, if you're making donut poppers, go ahead and spoon them into your mini1muffin tin, about 3/4 of the way full.

If you have a donut tin, you can either spoon the dough carefully into the tin, or use a frosting bag to pipe the batter in.  Not everyone has frosting bags on hand though, so an additional alternative once again is to turn to your handy Ziploc gallon bag.  Spoon the mixture into the bag, twist the excess top of the bag, and snip a corner off so that you can squeeze the batter out into the tray in a controlled fashion. Don't be tempted to fill the donut tin too full--more than halfway up and your donuts will expand too high when they bake and will lose the center hole.

Once the batter is in the tins, pop them in the oven for a mere 8 minutes.

Upon removing them from the oven, take them out of the tins, using a spoon to help if they stick a bit to the bottom of the pan.

Here's where it gets a little messy, but oh-so-worth it if you're making the cinnamon sugar or powdered sugar variety!  Take each donut and dip each side into your bowl of melted butter.  Don't let it sit there and get soggy, but just a quick dip on either side will do, then place it into the bag with the sugar.  Give it a few quick shakes and then remove and set the donut on a cooling rack.

For the best results with your powdered sugar donuts, you'll want to do a 2nd round of shaking them in the powdered sugar.  I wait until they've had a chance to cool, then put them bag into the bag of powdered sugar and shake to coat them again.

Serve warm or cool...either way, they are sure to disappear quickly! ;)