Daring Bakers' Challenge - October 2010 - Doughnuts

Blog-checking lines: The October 2010 Daring Bakers challenge was hosted by Lori of Butter Me Up. Lori chose to challenge DBers to make doughnuts. She used several sources for her recipes including Alton Brown, Nancy Silverton, Kate Neumann and Epicurious.

Mandatory Items: we should use any of the recipes provided.

Variations allowed: we could use our creativity to take these recipes and tweak them to come up with new, delicious varieties of doughnuts. We could use any type of toppings and fillings, we could make any shape we’d like, and we could make any size we like. We could add ingredients to the batters to make flavored doughnuts. The possibilities were endless.

Ok, so there were at least four different recipes for the dough. I've chosen the first one. Just because, at the forum, everybody was commenting it was the best one. Especially if you choose to bake the doughnuts instead of frying them. And definitely I would bake mine.

Oh, don't forget to check the other recipes at The Daring Kitchen website.

 Yeast Doughnuts:

1 1/2cup milk

70g butter

4 ½ tspoon active dry yeast

1/3 cup warm water

2 large eggs, beaten

¼ cup sugar

1 1/2 teaspoon table salt

1 tsp nutmeg, grated.

4 2/3 cup all purpose flour + extra for dusting surface

Place the milk in a medium saucepan and heat over medium heat just until warm enough to melt the shortening. (Make sure the shortening is melted so that it incorporates well into the batter.) Place the shortening in a bowl and pour warmed milk over. Set aside. In a small bowl, sprinkle the yeast over the warm water and let dissolve for 5 minutes. It should get foamy. After 5 minutes, pour the yeast mixture into the large bowl of a stand mixer and add the milk and shortening mixture, first making sure the milk and shortening mixture has cooled to lukewarm. Add the eggs, sugar, salt, nutmeg, and half of the flour. Using the paddle attachment of your mixer (if you have one), combine the ingredients on low speed until flour is incorporated and then turn the speed up to medium and beat until well combined. Add the remaining flour, combining on low speed at first, and then increase the speed to medium and beat well. Change to the dough hook attachment of the mixer and beat on medium speed until the dough pulls away from the bowl and becomes smooth, approximately 3 to 4 minutes (for me this only took about two minutes). If you do not have a dough hook/stand mixer – knead until the dough is smooth and not sticky. Transfer to a well-oiled bowl, cover, and let rise for 1 hour or until doubled in size. On a well-floured surface, roll out dough to 9 mm thick. (Make sure the surface really is well-floured otherwise your doughnuts will stick to the counter).Cut out dough using a 65 mm doughnut cutter or pastry ring or drinking glass and using a 22 mm ring for the center whole. Set on floured baking sheet, cover lightly with a tea towel, and let rise for 30 minutes.

Pre-heat the oven at 220ºC. Place your doughnuts in a baking pan and bake it for 10-15 minutes, or until they get golden. Let it cool before icing.

Note: If you are going to fry your doughnuts, it is highly recommended to place your uncooked ones on your slotted spoon first and lowering it into the hot oil that way to reduce the chance of injury. Also, try to always turn the spoon away from you to reduce the chances of oil splashing back up.

As you can see at the pictures, I made some doughnut without a hole. Those ones I filled with a chocolate ganache. Recipes below: 

 

Powdered Sugar Glaze

2 cups powdered (Icing) Sugar

1 cup whipped cream

Whisk powdered sugar and whipped cream to blend and form medium thick glaze. Spread the glaze over the doughnut with a spoon. Arrange doughnuts, glazed side up, on racks. Let stand until glaze sets, at least 30 minutes.

Note: this glaze can be made up to 3 hours ahead.  

Chocolate Ganache

200g semi sweet chocolate, chopped

1 cup whipping cream

Place the whipping cream in a saucepan and bring to boil in medium heat. Pour the cream over the chopped chocolate and mix well, until all the chocolate melts. Spread over the doughnuts with a spoon.

Filling Directions

Fit a pastry bag with a plain donut tip (6 mm tip) and fill with the ganache (you can also use a squeeze bottle). Poke the tip three-fourths of the way into the doughnut and squeeze in the preserves, pulling the tip out slightly as you squeeze to fill them as much as possible.

I also decided to make some savory doughnuts. I used the same dough of the sweet ones. I'd only added a little bit more salt and sprinkled dried basil and Himalayan pink salt on them.

Salmon and Cream Cheese Filling 

150g smoked salmon 

200g cream cheese

Scallion, chopped

Lime juice

Cut the salmon in small dices. Mix the cheese, the scallion and some drops of freshly squeezed lime juice. Add the salmon. Fill the doughnut and serve immediately.

I bought some Parma ham, some Spanish ham (Jamon Serrano), a delicious pepperoni filled with pistachios and some buffalo mozzarella. I made some "doughnut sandwiches"

Thanks very much Lori. I enjoyed a lot making my first ever doughnuts. My kids  and hubby loved them to. I'd baked them for a evening snack and we all had an amazing time that day.

Recipe Source: Check some other recipes.

The yeast doughnut is from Alton Brown:
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/yeast-doughnuts-recipe/in...

The cake doughnut is a Nancy Silverton recipe:
http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2007/06/cook-the-book-oldfashioned-bu...

The raspberry jam bomboloni recipe is a Kate Neumann recipe:
http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/raspberry-jam-bomboloni

The pumpkin doughnuts are from Bon Appétit:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Pumpkin-Doughnuts-with-Powd...

Additional Information:

Gluten-free recipe from Whole Living Daily:
http://wholelivingdaily.wholeliving.com/2010/06/fried-donuts-food-allerg...

Nancy Silverton’s instructions for doughnut making:
http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2007/06/cook-the-book-nancy-silverton...

Alton Brown making the Yeast Doughnuts:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AP8L9FXVNq4

This video is adorable – it’s a girl who has never made doughnuts before. What’s great too is that she uses what she has and didn’t buy any extra equipment/gadgets. Oh and it’s funny.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uw3iR3jA8Vc

A baked version of doughnuts and he shows how to make them in a bowl using a spoon + kneading:

http://wickedhowtos.com/index.php/2010/01/02/how-to-make-doughnuts/

Photos of doughnuts for inspiration on Flickr
http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=doughnut&w=all

Take a look at DK to check what other members have done. I'm sure you'll enjoy it.

Também em http://www.labgastro.blogspot.com/