Doughnuts
Difficulty level: Medium
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Here’s my American-style glazed doughnuts and cinnamon sugar coated dough balls made from the remaining dough. This recipe makes 6-8 doughnut rings and around 20 dough balls.

Ney's Tips

Tip #1 You can be creative with how you glaze or decorate your doughnuts from dipping them in a chocolate glaze to dusting them with just icing sugar. 

Tip #2 To fill your doughnuts with jam, lemon curd, custard or any of your favourite fillings, simple fry them whole on both sides and roll the doughnuts in granulated sugar (or icing sugar). Pierce a hole on one side of the doughnuts and used a piping bag to fill the doughnuts.

Tip #3 If you would prefer to bake the doughnuts, bake them in a preheated oven at 180º Celsius for about 8-10 minutes.

Tip #4 You can make beignets and yum yums using this recipe. Simply cut the dough into squares or rectangles and fry as per the recipe below. 

Donuts
Donuts
Servings
6
Prep Time
15 minutes
Cooking/Baking Time
15 minutes
Ingredients

4 fl. oz. milk

4 fl. oz. water

1 sachet of fast action dried yeast

14-16 oz. strong white bread flour

2 oz. granulated sugar

½ tsp. salt

1 oz. unsalted butter, melted

1 egg

1 litre vegetable oil for greasing and frying

For glazed doughnuts

8 plus 4 tbsp. icing sugar, sifted

3-4 tbsp. water or milk

For cinnamon sugar dough balls

3 tbsp. granulated sugar

1 ½ tsp. ground cinnamon

Method
  1. In a large mixing bowl, mix the milk, water, 1 tbsp. of the sugar and yeast. Cover and set aside for 8 minutes or until the mixture becomes frothy. In the meantime, mix the butter and egg in a separate bowl until combined and set aside. Once the yeast mixture has frothed up, add 14 oz. of flour, the remaining sugar, salt and the butter and egg mixture. Begin to mixture together to combine the ingredients. Turn the rough dough on to a lightly greased surface and begin to knead for 10-15 minutes until smooth. The consistency of the dough should be fairly wet. Add more flour if necessary. (If you have one, use a stand mixture with a dough hook attachment to knead the dough for 5-10 minutes until you reach the desired consistency).
  2. Grease the mixing bowl with some oil, place the dough inside, cover and set aside to prove for 2 hours in a warm place or until the dough has doubled in size.
  3. In the meantime, make the glaze by whisking 8 oz. of icing sugar and a little of water at a time until you reach a smooth yet runny consistency. Make the cinnamon sugar by combining both ingredients together in aa bowl, then sprinkle it over a large serving plate. Cover both and set aside. Line 2 large baking sheets with greaseproof paper.
  4. Once the dough has doubled in size, gently tip the dough onto a lightly floured surface being careful to no knock out any of the air bubbles. Use a lightly floured rolling pin to roll the dough about ½ inch thick. Use a 3 inch round cookie cutter to cut out the doughnuts and a 1 inch round cutter to cut out the wholes – I use the bottom of a large piping tip for this. I don’t recommend re-rolling the dough to cut out more doughnut rings. Instead, turn the scrap dough into dough balls, similar in size to the doughnut holes you cut out.
  5. Gently transfer the doughnut rings onto one of the lined baking sheets spacing them at least 2 inches apart. Place the dough balls on the other baking sheet. Gently brush the doughnuts and dough balls with oil to prevent them from drying out. Lightly cover with clingfilm and leave to rise for 30 minutes.
  6. With 8 minutes left to go until the dough has finished proving, place a 10-11 inch round frying pan on the stove. Fill the pan with about an inch of vegetable oil then heat to about 180º Celsius. Once the oil is up to temperature, gently cut round the doughnut rings so that they are sitting on their own individual squares of baking paper. 
  7. To test, fry a couple of dough balls for 20-30 seconds on each side. If they’re browning too quickly and are coming out raw, lower the heat.
  8. Lift a doughnut ring with the baking paper so that it holds its shape and carefully place the whole thing into the oil. Remove the baking paper from the oil with tongs – it will slide of the doughnut and it won’t burn. Use a spatula to gently turn over the doughnut one the underside has turned a golden brown. Remove from the oil, shake off any excess oil and place on paper towels. 
  9. The doughnut only needs to cook for 20-30 seconds on each side, but check one if you need to test for doneness. Once you’re happy with how the first doughnut turned out, cook a couple of doughnut rings at a time repeating the same process as above.  You may also need to adjust the heat from time to time between frying each batch to ensure the oil is back up to temperature.
  10. Fry the dough balls with the same method, then shake of any excess oil and place into the plate of cinnamon sugar. Remember to turn off the stove once everything is cooked. Roll and coat the dough balls with the cinnamon sugar.
  11. Whisk up the glaze adding more water if only if it needs. While they are still warm, dip the doughnut rings one at a tip in the bowl turning them over so that they are fully coated. Remove gently shaking any excess glaze then leave to set for 30 minutes on a wired rack with a baking sheet underneath. If you want to double glaze them, add the remaining icing sugar and a little water to about the same consistency and repeat the glaze process for each of the doughnuts. Leave to fully set.
  12. Enjoy your doughnuts!

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