If you haven't done so yet, I highly recommend getting yourself a couple of doughnut pans. They might seem like a frivolous novelty, but once you can have fresh vegan doughnuts in the morning without all the grease, you'll feel like less of an idiot for buying them.
There are tons of baked doughnut recipes out there and most of them are for making cake-style doughnuts. Although cake doughnuts are fantastic (and I'm sure they'll appear on this blog at least once), sometimes I want one of those chewy, yeasty ones.
This recipe makes delicious risen doughnuts, but because they aren't fried, they do taste different from the traditional kind. They're lighter and less greasy, which is a good thing in my book.
Ok, fine, OFTEN a good thing. Seriously though, these are worth it.
You'll need to set up a few things to start making the dough. First, you want to melt some vegetable shortening by warming it up in some soy milk and vanilla. You need to cool the mixture down afterwards, so don't bring it to a boil. You can speed up the cooling process by sticking it in the fridge, but you don't want it to be cold either. Just get it lukewarm.
While the soy milk mixture is cooling down, dissolve some yeast in warm water at the bottom of a mixing bowl. Also, stir up your dry ingredients.
Once your soy milk mixture is cool enough that it won't kill your yeast, you can mix it in along with the dry ingredients. A stand mixer with a hook attachment is the best way to get the dough smooth and elastic. Let it rise for an hour.
Now cut it into 12 chunks that are about the same size and roll them into 7" logs. Fun! Place the logs in the doughnut pans and connect the ends to form rings. Let your doughnuts rise for another hour.
Bake each pan of doughnuts for 10 minutes or until they're just starting to brown on top. The bottoms will be a darker color. Turn them over onto a wire rack and let them cool completely before decorating. I like to make a simple glaze with powdered sugar and soy creamer. If you want chocolate, add some cocoa powder.
Once the glaze is set, you better get to work devouring them. Like regular doughnuts, they're at their best when they're nice and fresh.
Baked Risen Doughnuts
Makes 1 dozen doughnuts
Important: You'll need doughnut pans to make this recipe. Also, be prepared to let the dough rise. Yeast dough takes 2 hours. If you don't want to get up early, try letting it rise overnight in the fridge.
Ingredients
Dough
1 cup soy milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup vegetable shortening
1 package active dry yeast
2 tablespoons warm water
3 1/4 cups flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
Topping
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
2-4 tablespoons soy creamer
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup cocoa powder (optional)
sprinkles (optional)
Method
- Prepare the dough. Combine soy milk, vanilla and shortening in a small saucepan over medium heat. Warm until shortening has almost melted but don’t bring to a boil. Set aside until lukewarm.
- Meanwhile, combine yeast and warm water in the bowl of an electric stand mixer. Combine flour, sugar, salt and nutmeg in a large bowl and set aside.
- Once the soymilk mixture is lukewarm, add it to the bowl with the yeast and mix until well combined. Add the dry ingredients in small batches while mixing at a low speed until smooth. Use a hook attachment to knead the dough on medium speed for 3-4 minutes or until the dough pulls away from the bowl and becomes smooth and elastic.
- Spray a large bowl generously with cooking spray and add the dough. Cover with a towel and allow to rise in a warm place for 1 hour.
- Once the dough has finished rising, divide it into 12 equal sized pieces. Roll into small logs about 7” in length, then connect the ends to form rings at the bottom of each cavity in the doughnut pan. Cover and let rise for another hour.
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees fahrenheit and coat doughnut pans with nonstick spray.
- Bake 10 minutes or until tops are just starting to brown. The bottoms will be a darker color. Transfer to wire racks and allow to cool.
- Prepare the topping. Whisk together the powdered sugar, soy creamer and vanilla in a wide bowl. Whisk in cocoa powder if you prefer a chocolate glaze. Dip one side of each doughnut into the glaze and allow the access to drip off. Decorate with sprinkles if desired.