No-Knead Donuts {Baked}

So this week we are making No-Knead Donuts which require No Machine and no deep fryer. 

How to bake Donuts?

So let's get baking! So I've made baked donuts before and they were a huge success with you guys. But then question I got asked was can you show us how to make a no-knead donut dough.

These donuts are way less fuss than a traditional donut and they're a little bit healthier than the fried ones. 

Method:

• So we're going to start in a large bowl. And the reason you use a large bowl is that we're going to prove our dough in the same bowl so we need to give it a lot of room. So into our bowl, I'm going to add in my flour, salt, and yeast. Now the reason I add them on separate sides of my bowl is that you don't want to lay your yeast onto your salt because it will deactivate so put them on separate sides of the bowl and then you can feel free to mix but just don't lay them on top of each other. 

• Ok. Perfect. We're going to set this bowl aside and mix all of our wet ingredients. In a separate jug, we're going to add in our warm milk and melted butter. A recipe with all that butter cannot be bad. Vanilla extract, honey for sweetness and your eggs. And then with a fork, simply whisk all of these ingredients together really well. You'll notice these are a lot of rich ingredients but that's what makes this dough so nice and buttery and eggy. It's delicious. Lovely. All of our eggs are mixed up. Ingredients are combined. So now we're going to add our wet into our dry ingredients. Then just take your spatula and mix until you've formed a dough. And this is it. What you're doing right now is eliminating the use of a machine. So give it a good mix up until all of the flour is combined. It is a bit of a soggy dough but that's ok. Also, using a no-knead method and developing your dough overnight means you develop more flavor and better texture. Ok, lovely. 

• As you can see, all our flour is wet there are no lumps in our dough. It smells beautiful and rich and a little bit vanilla-ey. Now the next part is where the magic happens. We're going to cover this in cling film and let it sit at room temperature for 2-3 hours. 

Once your three hours are up, we're going to pop this guy in the fridge overnight and then we're going to use him the next day but you can leave this dough for up to3 days in your fridge and use it whenever you want. Now I do get asked the question: can you rush this step and do you have to put it in the fridge overnight and the answer is YES. It's all very important to the result of your donuts. And as you can see, it's bubbly. It's around the same size after it was proofed. It doesn't grow a whole lot in the fridge. 

How to make Baked Donuts??

You can see the little bubbles. With no-knead doughs, essentially what you do is you take out the need of a mixer and you add in time. And time develops all of these gases, all of the bubbles, it strengthens the dough, it gives it all its texture. It's a fabulous way to make bread. Okie Dokie. 

I'm going to stop poking the dough now and I'm going to turn it out onto a floured surface and start cutting it. I don't know if you guys can see this but if you get in there what they're called are gluten strands and that is a strength. 

That is the sign of a strong dough. Beautiful. I'm going to flour the top of the dough a little bit, take a rolling pin and I'm going to roll it out to around a 1/4 inch thick because it is going to rise in the oven. how can you tell if it's a good dough and you can always tell because it leaves you a nice clean bowl, you can tell by the touch, how soft it is. It's seeing it growing. 

All of these types of things. So what I use to cut out my donuts is a scone cutter and the top of a piping nozzle because I'm not going to buy a donut cutter and this works just as well. Then we're going to save this guy because he is a donut hole and donut holes are just as delicious as regular donuts. So we're going to bake those off, too.

If you want to do some filled donuts like maybe with jam or Nutella, you can always leave it whole without cutting out the center, bake it, and then once they're baked and cooled you can fill them with jam or whatever you like. 

Once your donuts are cut out, we're going to lay them on a baking tray lined with parchment paper. Now it's essential to use a good quality baking tray because they tend to get a little bit overcooked on the bottom so if you want to even double-up on baking trays that will help a lot to keep the bottom soft and the top soft.

When you're laying your donuts on the tray, give them a bit of space each so they can grow and puff up. Once your donuts are all cut out we're going to cover them with a towel and let them proof at room temperature for around 20-30 minutes. Our donuts are proofed  So if you look you can see the edges have softened a little bit and it has risen. 

So that means it's well proofed and ready for the oven. But just before we pop them in the oven I'm going to brush them with a little bit of melted butter because it gives them a lovely golden brown color on the outside. Now today we are baking these but if you don't want to bake them and want to fry them that will work just as well. And you only have to shallow fry them you don't have to deep fry them. I'm going to bake my donuts at 375F/190C for around 15 minutes but keep a close eye on them because they do brown quite quickly. While our donuts are in the oven, we're going to get cracking on our glazes. Now, we're going to make three easy glazes but they're all very similar. For the first one, we're going to mix together icing sugar, vanilla extract, and milk. Mix it together until it's nice and smooth. For the second, we're going to mix together icing sugar, vanilla extract, milk, and a little bit of pink food dye. And mix together until smooth. And then for our last, we're going to mix together icing sugar, cocoa powder, vanilla extract, and milk. This chocolate glaze looks delicious. 

When the donuts are fresh out of the oven and still warm, that's when I like to dip them in the glaze because I feel like it soaks it up a lot better and makes it taste even more like a donut.

So I like to immerse it in the icing and then let it all drip off. Not all of it obviously. You still want some on there for the donut. You can actually see already instantly because the donut is warm, the icing sets and forms this lovely little shells. 

For the donuts with the sprinkles on them, I like to just dip the top in the icing. And then pull it out and I'm going to add the sprinkles on top. 

Don't be shy about adding on your sprinkles. Now for the chocolate one, I do something similar. Just dip in the top and let the excess drip off. I like to make my icings kind of thick so they really hold onto your donut but that's your own preference. And if you want to dunk the whole thing in the icing then go for it. So I'm going to add a little bit of grated chocolate on top of this donut just to give it a little bit of extra oomph. So these guys are best eaten warm so I'm going to crack one open and have a little try. If you can see all of the bubbles, and the layers that's what we created by fermenting this dough overnight.

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That's why it's a really good technique. This is gorgeous. You would never know that this is not a fried donut. This is such a great alternative to frying especially if you don't have a deep fryer or you don't want to fry. Like why should you if you can bake them just as good. Make sure you share your photos of your donuts on my social media because I love to see them. Thank you so much.