Gluten Free Desserts: Homemade Donut Recipe & Tips

Driving by a donut shop is a killer on Sunday mornings. We used to go out for a hot drink and a yummy donut BC ( before celiac). Now that I am living AC (after celiac), those mornings are over. Ah well, no use crying over spilt milk. I think I’ll pour myself a glass and sit here and eat my homemade donuts.There’s no reason why gluten free desserts can’t be better than the original.

Craving Gluten Free Donuts?
Use these tips and recipe to get started.

Tip # 1  Start with Cake Donuts

It is easier to make cake donuts than yeast donuts, so start here for your first endeavor.

Make sure your donut batter is wet and sticky. You should not be able to roll it out easily, in fact, you really do not want to roll it out at all. Take your dough and place it in a pastry bag and pipe out your donuts onto parchment paper and bake. You could also fry them if you don’t mind the extra calories.

To bake, use a special donut pan to help them retain there shape or buy one of the new mini donut makers and pop out lots of cute little donuts just like the ones at the fair.

Tip #2  Don’t shape them at all!

There is no reason to shape your cake donuts unless you just want to be able to gaze upon something that looks like the donuts you used to eat. You can drop teaspoons of the batter into hot oil and fry them up.

They will look like that famous donut shops small holes. You can even coat them in powdered sugar, cinnamon sugar, a sugar glaze or a chocolate glaze. They will look so much like the real thing it will probably fool everyone.

Tip #3 Use parchment paper for yeast donuts

Okay! You are ready to try your hand at yeast donuts. How do you transfer a sticky, wet dough into hot oil without making a major mess and still have it come out looking like a donut?

Use squares of parchment to pipe your donut dough on. When the oil is hot, just drop in the whole thing, paper and all until the donut cooks on one side. Then pull off the paper with tongs , flip the donut over and fry on the other side.

If your donut shape is a little lopsided, you can try and fix it by wetting your hands and coaxing it back into shape. I don’t bother. Hey, these are homemade, they are not perfect!

I’m just lucky I found time to even make these. I’m not worried about appearances. As long as they taste good, no one in my house cares.

Tip #4    Gently toss the coatings on.

Place your sugar type coatings in a large bowl and gently toss your hot donuts in the mixture to coat.

For glazes, place your hot donuts on a wire rack that is set on top of a piece of parchment or waxed paper. Put your glaze in a wide shallow bowl. Gently grasp the donut and place the top of it in the glaze. This will coat the top for you.

If you want the whole donut covered, drop your donut in the glaze, turn over with a fork and gently lift out and place on the wire rack to drip and set up.

Try this recipe out. Works great with the donut maker.

Lemon Poppy Seed donuts

1 1/4 cup gluten free flour blend
1/2 cup sugar  
1/2 tsp. xanthan gum
1 tablespoon poppy seeds
3/4 tsp. baking powder
3/4 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 egg
1/3 cup buttermilk
1/3 cup sour cream or plain yogurt
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
2 tsp. lemon juice or apple cider vinegar
1 tsp grated lemon peel
1/2 tsp. gluten free vanilla extract
2 tsp. powdered sugar mixed with 1 tsp cinnamon

 Preheat the donut maker or the oven to 400 degrees.

  In a large bowl, combine all the dry ingredients and whisk together. In a small bowl, combine all the wet ingredients(including the lemon peel) except the cinnamon sugar and mix. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and stir until combined.

  For the donut maker: Place the donut mix into a zip type bag and snip off a 1/4″ of the corner. When the donut maker is ready, squeeze the batter into the molds and cook for about 1 1/2 minutes. Remove with chopsticks to a wire rack and allow to cool. Repeat to finish all the donut batter. Dust with powdered sugar. Makes 30.

  For the oven: Spray a 6 mold donut pan or six 4″ tube pans with non-stick cooking spray. Spoon the batter into the molds and bake for 10-12 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool for 5 minutes and then remove and place on wire racks to cook completely. Dust with powdered sugar. Makes 6 large donuts. 

Here’s a link to another recipe for you to try: Old Fashioned Gluten Free Donuts by the Baking Beauties

I love to cook and bake. I want you to enjoy it too.

Kathy

Ps… so go buy some fun gadgets!