Donuts can be made from different kinds of dough or batter, so there isn’t one ingredient list that applies to every recipe.
Flour is the base of the cake and yeast donut recipes discussed here. Other common ingredients include sugar, salt, liquid, fat, and a leavening agent. Eggs, milk, water, butter, shortening, and oil appear in different recipes, but they aren’t all required in the same batch. Fillings and toppings, such as jam, custard, glaze, chocolate, and sprinkles, are separate additions.
Do Donuts Have To Be Fried?
When we hear the word donut, the image of a deep-fried pastry with a hole in the center comes to mind.
That is one familiar form, but donuts can also be baked. For example, King Arthur Baking’s Baked Doughnuts Three Ways uses batter in a donut pan.
You may use different recipes for the dough.
Texture varies too. A yeast donut can be light and chewy, while a cake donut can have a denser crumb.
Main Ingredients Used To Make Donuts
Cake donuts and yeast-raised donuts are two common styles. Cake recipes generally use baking powder or baking soda, while yeast-raised recipes use yeast.
Both styles use flour, but the rest of the formula varies. A recipe might call for milk or water, eggs, sugar, salt, and a fat such as butter, shortening, or oil. Use the ingredients and amounts in the recipe rather than treating those options as interchangeable.
Eggs and dairy aren’t required in every recipe. There are vegan donut recipes, and there are also gluten-free recipes that use a specified flour blend. If you need one of those versions, start with a recipe developed for it.
Fried versions also need fat for frying. That is separate from any butter, shortening, or oil that goes into the dough. Baked versions don’t need a frying bath.
For frying, a neutral-tasting oil can be useful if you don’t want it to add a strong flavor.
Ring donuts, filled donuts, and donut holes are three familiar forms.
1. Ring Donuts
As the name suggests, ring donuts are circular donuts with a hole in the center.
Some rings are cut from rolled or flattened dough with a donut cutter. Other recipes pipe soft dough into rings or portion batter into a ring-shaped pan.
The hole in the center gives the snack its signature look.
The hole does not guarantee that the center is cooked. You still need to follow the recipe’s size, cooking temperature, timing, and doneness instructions.
2. Filled Donuts
Filled donuts often take the form of solid rounds, without the open center of a ring donut. They can be coated in sugar or finished with glaze; a glaze isn’t required.
These donuts are usually filled with sweet ingredients like jam, fruit, cream, or custard.
3. Donut Holes
Donut holes can be made from the centers cut out of ring donuts, but they can also be made separately from small portions of dough or batter.
They may be fried or baked, and the finish can be a glaze or a sugar coating. King Arthur Baking’s Cinnamon Baked Doughnut Holes, for example, are made from batter and coated in cinnamon sugar.
Apart from these classic shapes, you may also come across variants like square donuts.
We can also classify donuts based on the ingredients and method of preparation. Let us look at this in closer detail.
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Different Types Of Donuts Based On The Ingredients
We mentioned earlier that you could use different dough recipes to make donuts.
Two common categories are:
- Cake donuts, and
- Yeast donuts.
The leavening agent is an important difference between these styles, but the other ingredients and the way you handle the mixture affect the flavor and texture too.
Yeast dough needs time to ferment and rise, so that stage affects how you plan the recipe.
Cake donuts don’t need yeast proofing, although a recipe may still call for a rest or other preparation time.
These two categories don’t cover every donut. French crullers, for example, use a cooked paste called choux pastry; King Arthur Baking’s Classic French Crullers recipe uses no yeast, baking powder, or baking soda.
1. Cake Donuts
Cake donut mixtures can be thick batter or a soft dough that is cut into shapes.
They use chemical leavening, such as baking powder or baking soda, to help them rise. These ingredients produce carbon dioxide through chemical reactions; the process isn’t limited to frying.
Baking soda and baking powder aren’t interchangeable. Baking soda needs the right balance of acidic ingredients, so use the leavener and amount that the recipe specifies.
Compared with a light yeast donut, a cake donut generally has a denser, cake-like crumb. That doesn’t mean it should be tough.
The cake itself can carry plenty of flavor. For example, a chocolate cake donut gets flavor from its batter, while a glaze or topping adds another layer.
2. Yeast Donuts
These donuts use yeast as the leavening agent.
During fermentation, yeast produces carbon dioxide. Gas trapped in the dough helps it expand, which contributes to the light, airy texture.
A yeast donut can be soft and fluffy with a chewy bite.
Fermentation also contributes to the flavor, but it doesn’t mean every yeast donut tastes sour. A sourdough donut is a particular variation, rather than the flavor you should expect from all yeast donuts.
How Are Donuts Made?
The method depends on the recipe and the style of donut. A baked cake batter won’t go through all the same stages as a cut-out yeast dough.
The steps below explain the main stages you may come across. If you are making donuts, use a complete tested recipe, such as King Arthur Baking’s Yeast-Raised Doughnuts or Baked Doughnuts Three Ways, for the quantities, equipment, temperature, and timing.
1. Setting Up The Ingredients
Donut dough and batter use both dry and wet ingredients.
Each ingredient is sourced, measured, and put aside till it’s time to bring the dough together.
Measure the amounts for the recipe and batch size that you are making.
2. Preparing The Dough
Follow the recipe’s mixing order. Some recipes combine dry and wet mixtures, while others start by beating fat with sugar or add ingredients in stages.
The amount of mixing matters too. A yeast dough may need kneading, while a cake batter may only need stirring. Some cut-out cake recipes include brief kneading, so don’t apply one rule to every mixture. Use equipment suited to that recipe and the amount of dough.
3. Resting The Dough
Many yeast recipes include a rise after mixing or kneading.
As the yeast ferments sugars, it produces carbon dioxide, and the gas retained in the dough helps it increase in volume.
Use the recipe’s readiness cues as well as its estimated time. How quickly the dough rises depends on the recipe and the conditions, so one fixed resting time will not work for every batch.
4. Shaping The Donuts
Shaping can mean cutting dough, piping rings, scooping small pieces, or putting batter into a pan.
For a cut-out recipe, roll or flatten the dough to the specified thickness before using a cutter. Piped rings and pan-baked batter use different methods, so follow the one intended for that mixture.
When a recipe calls for filled rounds, leave the center intact.
5. Proofing The Donuts
Some yeast donut recipes call for another rise after shaping. This gives the pieces time to expand before they are cooked; cake donuts don’t need this yeast-proofing stage.
Follow the recipe’s temperature and readiness cues rather than assuming that this will take one hour. Different doughs and room conditions can change the time.
6. Frying Or Baking
For fried donuts, heat the frying fat to the temperature in your recipe and monitor it with a suitable thermometer, including between batches. Lower the pieces carefully into the oil rather than dropping them from a height.
Cooking time depends on the recipe, the size of the pieces, and the oil temperature. If the oil is too hot, the outside can brown before the inside is cooked.
Golden-brown color can be one cue, but it is not enough on its own. Follow the recipe’s full cooking and doneness instructions. For baked donuts, use its oven temperature, pan, and doneness test instead of borrowing the instructions for frying.
Don’t taste raw donut dough or batter. The CDC advises against eating raw dough or batter because flour and eggs can contain harmful germs.
7. Glazing And Filling
Let the recipe guide when you glaze the donuts. Some finishes go onto warm donuts, while others call for them to cool completely.
You may dip just the top, drizzle the glaze, or coat more of the donut, depending on the finish.
There isn’t one setting time for every glaze. Allow it to set as the recipe directs.
Filling and glazing are separate decisions. For example, King Arthur Baking’s Easy Jelly Doughnut Holes are cooled before jam is piped inside, then coated in sugar.
The donut may be filled with jam or fruit preserves, custard, or cream.
If you use a perishable cream or custard filling, keep the finished donuts refrigerated at 40°F (4°C) or below. FDA guidance says refrigerated perishable foods should not stay at room temperature for more than two hours, or one hour when it is above 90°F (32°C). Follow any storage directions for the filling or finished product; don’t assume that advice for a plain donut applies to a cream-filled one.
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Classic Glazing And Other Donut Toppings
A simple vanilla glaze can be made with confectioners’ sugar, milk or water, and vanilla. That is one option; King Arthur Baking’s Three Easy Doughnut Glazes also includes chocolate and apple-cider versions.
Prepare the glaze and apply it at the stage its recipe recommends. A warm-donut method for one glaze doesn’t mean that every icing should go onto a warm donut.
After the glazing is applied, the donuts should be allowed to rest for some time to let them set.
You can add sprinkles for extra texture and color.
For a dry coating, you can use granulated sugar, cinnamon sugar, or confectioners’ sugar. Follow the recipe’s cooling instructions, especially when using confectioners’ sugar.
These finishes are different from jam or jelly used as a filling. Choose the coating and filling you want, then follow their preparation and storage directions.
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