Donuts!

Hello again! I don't know if you noticed, but this is no longer just a cupcake blog. It's now pretty much for anything I want whether it's cooking or fashion. So, today I wanted to show you a recipe I recently found and made, courtesy of pinterest. The original recipe for these amazing baked donuts can be found here at Krissy's Creations. If you don't want to read her entire post, (though I recommend looking at the pictures) here's the gist of it:
Doughnuts are really fattening, right? They're all deep fried and covered in sugar and stuff. So, what if you could make yummy, indulgent donuts without that part? That, my friends, is where these come in. You can now have delicious donuts without all the extra icky stuff! I made mine with glaze, but you can also use cinnamon sugar topping.

Baked Doughnuts

Dough:

3/4 cups Warm Milk

1 packet Active Dry Yeast

1 tbsp. Unsalted Butter

1/3 cup Sugar

1 Egg

2 ½ cup All Purpose Flour

Pinch of Nutmeg

½ tsp. Salt

Glaze:

* Enough to glaze all the doughnuts

¼ cup Milk

1 tsp. Pure Vanilla Extract

2 cups Confectioners Sugar

Cinnamon Sugar Topping:

*Enough to cover all of the doughnuts

½ cup Unsalted Butter

1 cup Sugar

1 tbsp. Cinnamon

To make the dough, place ¼ cups of the warm milk in the bowl of a stand mixer.  Sprinkle the yeast over the milk.  Let sit for 5 minutes.

In a small bowl, combine the remaining ½ cup of milk with the sugar and butter.  Add it to the yeast mixture.  Stir to combine.  Add the egg and stir until incorporated.  Add the flour, nutmeg, and salt and stir until the dough starts to form.  Change to the dough hook and knead for until the dough starts to become smooth.  If the dough is too sticky, slowly add more flour until it is no longer sticky. 

Transfer to the dough to a lightly floured surface and knead for 5 minutes until the dough is smooth and elastic and has formed a ball.  Place the dough ball in a large lightly greased bowl, and cover with plastic wrap.  Let sit in a warm place for about 1 hour, until doubled in size. 

Once the dough has risen, roll it out on a lightly floured surface until ½ thick.  Using a doughnut cutter (if you don’t have a doughnut cutter, you can use 2 biscuit cutters – 1 that is about 3 inches, and the other that is about 2 inches for the inner circle) cut out the doughnuts until you have no dough left.  If desired you can gather up the scraps into a ball and roll it out and cut out more doughnuts.  I prefer not too because I feel the dough becomes too tough.

Place the doughnuts on a baking sheet lined with a silicone mat or parchment paper, about 2 inches apart.  Cover with a clean towel and let sit for about 45 minutes.

Preheat the oven 375 degrees F. 

Place the baking sheets in the oven and bake for 7 minutes, until lightly golden brown.  Be careful to not overbake these.  You want them to be light and doughy inside.  Let the doughnuts cool for about 5 minutes until ready to top with either the glaze or cinnamon sugar topping

While the doughnuts are cooling make the glaze and/or cinnamon sugar glaze.  Each recipe makes enough to cover all the doughnuts.  I made a half recipe of each and topped half of the doughnuts with each topping.  Or you can choose to just do one of topping for all the doughnuts. 

To make the glaze, combine the milk and the vanilla in a small saucepan.  Heat over low heat until just warmed.  Slowly add in the confectioners sugar and whisk until the mixture is smooth.  Remove the glaze from the heat and place over a bowl of warm water.

To glaze the doughnuts, dip them halfway into the glaze and place on a draining/cooling rack set over a baking sheet.  Sprinkle with sprinkles if desired.  Let set for about 10 minutes.

To make the cinnamon sugar topping, melt the butter in a saucepan or a microwave, and place in a small bowl.  Combine the sugar and cinnamon in a medium sized bowl. 

To top the doughnuts with cinnamon sugar, dip the halfway into the melted butter.  Then dip them into the cinnamon-sugar mixture.  Set on a draining/cooling rack to set, about 5 minutes.

Serve and enjoy :)!

Spoilers!

I have new cupcakes! I don't have time to do posts on them at the moment, but I will be posting three new recipes, so stay tuned!

It's Finally Here!

I know you have waited for this, so I will tell you right now. The cupcake recipe I was talking about last month? I am finally posting it. So here it is-Nutmeg Cupcakes!

Nutmeg Cupcakes
Makes 12

•  1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 pinch salt
• 8 tablespoons butter, softened (1 stick)
• 1 cup white sugar
• 3 eggs 
• 2/3 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 
• 1 tablespoon grated nutmeg

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Line a standard muffin tin with 12 cupcake liners. Combine flour, baking soda, and salt in a bowl, set aside.
2. Beat the butter and sugar in an electric mixer until thoroughly combined. Add the eggs and vanilla, until it has thickened slightly and is slightly yellow. Slowly mix in the flour mixture and milk, alternating until completely mixed. Add nutmeg and mix.
3. Divide the cupcake batter evenly between liners. Bake until a toothpick comes out clean, or 15-20 minutes. Let them cool in the pan for 2 minutes, then transfer to a cooling rack until they are ready to frost.
   
   Vanilla Buttercream Frosting
   frosts 12 cupcakes

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 3 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
• 1 teaspoon milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/8 teaspoon salt 
•  1 teaspoon grated nutmeg

1. In a bowl combine butter, sugar, nutmeg and salt. Beat till blended.
   Add the milk and vanilla and beat for an additional 3 to 5 minutes or until smooth and creamy.

Cupcake Rant :)

So, after a couple mess ups that weren't worthy of my blog, a summer long break and Thinking constantly about cupcakes the past week, I finally decided to make more cupcakes. The only problem-I didn't know what to make. So, I just made plain vanilla cupcakes. But towards the end, I had an idea. So I threw in a bunch of stuff, mixed the batter more than nessasary and ended up with runny batter to pour into my cupcakes. Right now, I'm sure you're thinking, oh no! The cupcakes didn't work! But instead, I ended up wil some of the most gorgeous cupcakes ever. Just you wait and see, you'll find a delicious new recipe tomorrow. BUT until then, I have a picture:

Sorry it's upside down. ;) Anyway, see ya!

Come see my cupcakes!

So tomorrow, (Saturday, June 23) for those of you can, come to the suncrest yard sale! I will be selling cupcakes there.

Wild berry cupcakes

So, I know I've been a slacker lately, but I made a new type of cupcake a little while ago and I'm finally going to post it. And the mystery cupcake is...
WILD BERRY CUPCAKES
So here we go:

Wild Berry Cupcakes
makes 12

• 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 pinch salt
• 8 tablespoons butter, softened (1 stick)
• 1 cup white sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2/3 cup milk

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Line a standard muffin tin with 12 cupcake liners. Combine flour, baking soda, and salt in a bowl, set aside.
2. Beat the butter and sugar in an electric mixer until thoroughly combined. Add the eggs and vanilla until it has thickened slightly and is slightly yellow. Slowly mix in the flour mixture and milk, alternating until completely mixed.
3. Divide the cupcake batter evenly between liners.  Bake until a toothpick comes out clean, or 15-20 minutes. Let them cool in the pan for 2 minutes, then transfer to a cooling rack. Scoop out a small amount of the top of the cupcake and fill.

Wild Berry frosting and filling
frosts/fills 12

• 14 strawberries with the tops cut off
• 1 1/2 cups blueberries
• 1 cup butter, softened
• 3 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
• 1 teaspoon milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/8 teaspoon salt

1. In a bowl combine butter, sugar and salt. Beat till blended.
   Add the milk and vanilla and beat for an additional 3 to 5 minutes or until smooth and creamy. 
2.  Blend 10 of the strawberries and 1 cup of blueberries together. Add small amounts of this into the frosting until you like the flavor.
3. Slice the remaining strawberries and mix with the remaining 1/2 cup of blueberries. Fill the cupcakes with this mixture then frost. Add extra filling as a decoration.

And... I'll be making milky way cupcakes soon, so stay tuned!
  

Almond Joy

As promised, I made the almond joy cupcakes. They turned out great, so I hope you try them out.

Chocolate Almond Cupcakes
Makes 16

• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/3 cup cocoa powder
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
• 1 cup water
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
• 1 tablespoon vinegar
• 1 cup toasted almonds, chopped

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line muffin tins with 16 paper liners. 
2. Mix together flour, baking soda, salt and cocoa powder in a bowl. Set aside.
3. In an electric mixer, mix together the sugar and butter. Add the vanilla and almond extract until the batter is thickened slightly. Mix in the flour mixture, vinegar, water and chopped almonds until thoroughly combined. 
4. Distribute batter evenly liners and cook for 20-25 minutes. Let cool on a cooling rack and frost.

 Coconut-Almond Buttercream Frosting
frosts 16 

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 3 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
• 1 teaspoon milk
• 1 teaspoon almond extract
• 1/8 teaspoon salt 
• 1/4 cup of shredded coconut
• 16 toasted almonds (for topping)
• 1/4 cup toasted shredded coconut (for topping)

1.  In a bowl combine butter, sugar and salt. Beat till blended. 
2. Add the milk and almond extract and beat for an additional 3 to 5 minutes or until smooth and creamy. 
3. Mix in the non-toasted shredded coconut and frost the cupcakes. (if you pipe it, don't use a tip) 
4. Put toasted coconut and an almond on each cupcake and enjoy!