Today’s little treat was inspired by Voodoo Doughnuts, which is the perfect place to get your doughnut fix this weekend, where you can get dirt doughnuts, little voodoo doughnut dolls, or plenty of doughnuts complete with candy. Of course, that’s if you live in Portland, OR. The rest of us have to make our own, like these little “Dirty Snow” doughnuts.

The Voodoo dirty snowball coats a fried chocolate cake doughnut in pink marshmallow icing and coconut (for the snow) and then swirls on a little peanut butter icing dog poo for good measure. I took the same basic premise, but simplified using baked chocolate cake doughnuts, powdered sugar and a chocolate ganache poo. Trick or treat indeed.

On a side note, these particular doughnuts were made from the King Arthur doughnut mix & baked in a Blinq doughnut maker (which is basically like this one). The good thing about the doughnut maker is that it cooks both the tops and bottoms of the doughnuts (like a waffle iron), so they get a great doughnut shape and are equally done on the tops and bottoms. It only makes 6 doughnuts at a time though, and it gets really hot, so although it seems like a good thing to do with kids, they’d need a lot of supervision. It’s also quite hard to tell when the doughnuts are done (I just guessed, and was pretty close most of the time). For the chocolate doughnuts, it’s really better to err on the side of undercooked.

As for the King Arthur chocolate doughnut mix (all biases aside!), it is very simple and makes delicious and tender chocolate treats. But they are really more like chocolate cupcakes baked into a doughnut shape than doughnuts both flavor and texture wise. And really, the only thing it saves you is a little bit of measuring of a few dry ingredients. I’m pretty sure it’s not really worth the $8(+shipping!), although as part of a gift, it might be fun. But I think it would be more personal (and more tasty) to make your own gift mix! Stay tuned for a few ideas on that in the coming couple of weeks.

Finally, I want to say a HUGE thank you to the bloggers who contributed to the Doughnuts virtual blog tour! It makes me so happy to see folks having fun with the book, and wow, there were some amazing creations! If you didn’t get a chance to stop by, here are the posts:

CakeSpy’s adorable doughut drawing
Wasabi Prime’s Baked Maple Buns
The Sophisticated Gourmet’s Raised Glazed
Use Real Butter’s Apple Cider Doughnuts for High Altitude Baking!
Cannelle et Vanille’s Gluten Free Maple Glazed
Cream Puffs in Venice’s Birthday Creme Brulee and Maple Glazed Raised

You guys are awesome!!

And, so are these lovely folks who weren’t officially on the blog tour, but have been blogging all about their amazing doughnuts! Check them out:

Joy the Baker’s Baked Chocolate Doughnut Muffins
Ria’s DB doughnuts with my Chocolate Glaze recipe
Family Friendly Food’s Ricotta Drops
It’s My Darlin’s Baked French Crullers
City Arts Magazine’s Maple Bacon Bars
Healthy Chef’s S’More Doughnuts
Kitchen Klatch’s Old Fashioned Sour Creams
My Tartlette’s S’more and (!) Gluten Free Candy Filled Doughnuts

And finally, if you haven’t seen them, the Daring Bakers have been busy cranking out the doughnuts for October… they (mostly) weren’t using my recipes (timing didn’t quite work), but I’d eat their doughnuts anyday! Check out FoodGawker to tempt yourself.

Have you blogged about doughnuts you’ve made from the book? If so, let me know!

Before anything else, I want to say a huge thank you to a few folks. My publisher, for turning my idea into something so beautiful. My friends and family for encouraging me along the way. My testers for working with me to really make the recipes shine (testers: expect email from me soon… I thought a had a couple more weeks before the book was ready!) You simply cannot make a book all on your own, and I know I certainly couldn’t have done it without all of you.

So, with that, I am celebrating with some doughnuts and I thought it would be fun to share a recipe. How about some Baked Chocolate Cake Doughnuts!

This recipe isn’t in the book, but it is just a slight variation of the baked cake doughnut recipe that is. The beauty of the baked cake doughnuts is that they come together in a very short time… it’s only about 30 minutes from start to finish, and there’s no oil to deal with at the end.

You do need a doughnut pan to get a good doughnut shape. I prefer the mini doughnuts to the larger ones when baking… the smaller size bakes a bit more evenly and stay a bit more tender. If you don’t have a doughnut pan though, don’t fret. You can still make the batter and cook it up in a muffin tin (again, mini muffin tins work best) for doughnut flavored muffins.

This recipe only makes about 15 mini doughnuts, so chance are you may not have many left at the end of breakfast… but if you do end up with leftovers, come back tomorrow for a fun recipe for using doughnuts that have become a bit stale. It is almost worth making a double batch, just to have the leftovers!

Baked Chocolate Cake Doughnuts

It may seem strange to add nutmeg to a chocolate recipe, but nutmeg is the key to a recognizable doughnut flavor. It’s fine to leave it out, but your doughnuts may taste a bit more like chocolate cupcakes.

130 grams (~1 cup) all purpose flour
2 tablespoons natural cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
75 grams sugar
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon fine grain salt
2 tablespoons unsalted butter or coconut oil
1/4 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup yogurt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 large egg

Lightly grease a doughnut (or muffin) tin and preheat the oven to 350F.

Sift the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and baking soda, and then whisk in the sugar, nutmeg and salt.

Add the butter, and using your fingers, rub it into the dry ingredients until it becomes coarse crumbs.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the buttermilk, yogurt, vanilla and egg. Add to the flour mixture and stir until just combined. Do not overmix, or your doughnuts may be a bit rubbery.

Fill each cup 1/2 to 3/4 full. You can do this with a spoon, but I prefer using a piping bag to fill each cup more evenly and cleanly. It’s important not to overfill, or as the doughnuts rise, you’ll lose the hole.

Bake for 6 to 10 minutes (depending on the size of your doughnut pan), until the doughnuts spring back when touched. Let cool slightly on a wire rack before glazing. If coating in powdered sugar, let them cool even a bit more.

Makes about 15 mini doughnuts.

Buttermilk Glaze

Doughnut glaze is very simple to make… basically just mixing powdered sugar with some sort of liquid. For these doughnuts, I used a splash of buttermilk, but you can use milk, water, or any liquid. Start with about 1 cup of powdered sugar in a bowl, and add about 1 teaspoon of buttermilk. Start blending with a spoon until you get a thick paste. Add more buttermilk in very small amounts, at about 1/4 teaspoon at a time, and stir it in, using the back of the spoon to break down any clumps. You are aiming for a consistency that is about like a thick cake icing. If you add too much liquid at once, you won’t be able to get out the clumps. Once you get a smooth mixture, continue adding liquid at 1/4 teaspoon at a time until you get a slightly thinner glaze that slowly drips from the spoon.

As for news on the book – if you didn’t see my tweet earlier today, I got the first PDF view of all the recipes and photos flowed together today! It’s incredible to see it almost done… I just keep paging through and giggling. Now, just one more round of edits, a few interior photo tweaks, and finalizing the cover and my part will be done… then begins the long wait to press and getting the hard copy in my hands. I simply cannot wait!

It’s Menu For Hope time, one of my favorite blogging times of the year. Menu for Hope raises money for those the World Food Program to help feed those who are hungry. You purchase raffle tickets, for $10 each, towards donated prizes. Each $10 you spend gets you another chance to win. There are so many great prizes this year, I know you will have fun browsing through them. For a full list, see Chez Pim’s site.

Usually, I post about my offering over on Cook & Eat. But this year, I’m offering up a package I’m calling “Time to Shoot the Doughnuts!” which seemed more fitting for this blog & my Still Life With blog.

My package, code UW32, is for a 1 on 1 day of food photography & styling workshop in my studio. We will tackle food styling, camera and light settings and spend the afternoon practicing! The winner is responsible for travel and lodging to Seattle, WA. Doughnuts, lunch and equipment will be provided.

OR If you’d rather (because maybe you can’t get to Seattle or you just LOVE doughnuts), you can choose a personalized doughnut kit instead. This kit will including a recipe of the winner’s choice from Doughnuts before it is published, a doughnut cutter and mini doughnut baking sheet, the dry ingredients for the doughnut recipe of the winner’s choice, and a signed copy of Doughnuts once it is released. I’ll also include some online photography mentoring for 1 month.

I hope this inspires you to get out there and bid! I know that we are all on tighter budgets these days, but hunger doesn’t go away because our own funds run low.

To Donate and Enter the Menu for Hope Raffle

Here’s what you need to do:

1. Choose a bid item or bid items of your choice from our Menu for Hope main bid item list. (mine is UW32)

2. Go to the donation site at Firstgiving and make a donation.

3. Please specify which bid item you’d like in the ‘Personal Message’ section in the donation form when confirming your donation. You must write-in how many tickets per bid item, and please use the bid item code.

Each $10 you donate will give you one raffle ticket toward a bid item of your choice. For example, a donation of $50 can be 2 tickets for EU01 and 3 tickets for EU02 – 2xEU01, 3xEU02.

4. If your company matches your charity donation, please check the box and fill in the information so we could claim the corporate match.

5. Please check the box to allow us to see your email address so that we can contact you in case you win. Your email address will not be shared with anyone.

Check back on Chez Pim on Monday, January 18 for the results of the raffle.

Thanks for your participation, and good luck in the raffle!

The good news for you all is that once the book is finalized, I can start releasing some of the recipes that we cut here!

Chocolate Yeast Raised Doughnuts with Peanut Butter Filling and Chocolate Glaze. Kind of insanely delicious.

Today, I was shooting possibly one of my favorite recipes (and certainly my husband’s favorite), the cruller. If you find crullers at most doughnut shops in the US, they will probably be somewhat heavy, cake doughnuts that are piped with cool ridges. In Canada, however, a cruller means a French Cruller which has the same ridges, but is made with a cream puff dough (pate e choux). These doughnuts are rich and eggy, but super light at the same time. It took me quite some time to get the recipe just right, but I’m happy to say, I’ve got it down, so today’s photoshoot was a joy. A delicious joy at that!

I thought I’d share a few outtakes to tempt you:

Anyone want to swing by and try a few? Get them while they last!

How I ended up writing a doughnut cookbook is still a bit of a magically happy mishap for me. Late in the fall of 2008, I started thinking about cookbooks that would be fun to photograph. Having already shot two single-subject books… Popcorn and Tacos: Authentic, Festive & Flavorful… I was enjoying the challenge of taking such a narrow subject and seeing how many different ways I could photograph them. My mind turned to doughnuts.

Soon, I started pestering a few of my writerly friends… “Hey, you should write a doughnut cookbook so I can photograph it.” I got no takers. So, when Sasquatch Books asked me if I’d be interested in writing a cookbook of my own, I knew exactly what it would be.

The only problem was that although I’ve certainly eaten my fair share of doughnuts, I’d never actually made them beyond simply cracking open a can of Pillsbury biscuits, cutting out a hole and frying them. Suddenly, here I was with a book deal based on the idea that anyone can make doughnuts at home, and I was a doughnut newbie.

There was nothing to do but get started. In April, I developed my list of rough ideas about what I like in doughnuts and then the research and doughnut making began in earnest. As for research, you’d think that there would be at least a dozen or so doughnut cookbooks available that I could learn from. Surprise! There is really only one true doughnut cookbook that I could find, and it’s a tiny little thing filled with quaint (but good) historical recipes. There are quite a few great books on the business of doughnuts or the history of the doughnut, with a few recipes, again mostly historic, tossed in for good measure. But nothing like what exists around the world of cupcakes. Nothing that pairs great doughnut basics with interesting new flavors. No doughnut book that starts to address the specialized needs of today’s home cooks… things like gluten free, vegan, or baked instead of fried.

After six months and more doughnuts than I care to mention, I’ve ended up with over 70 recipes that I think will tempt and excite. They are as easy as they are delicious, without the need for fancy equipment. There are doughs for those who are gluten free or vegan and those who aren’t fond of deep fried anything. There are doughs for ex-pat Canadians who are hundreds of kilometers away from the nearest Tim Horton’s Honey Crullers. There are doughs that would make a Dunkin’ Donuts or Krispy Kreme lover happy. There are flavors for adults (Margarita, Creme Brullee), those for kids (Candy-stuffed Chocolate Drops). There are traditional doughnuts from outside the US (Malasadas, Picarones, Zeppole). And finally, in the rare case where you find yourself with leftover doughnuts, there are a handful of recipes to breathe new life into them.

All this from someone who six months ago had never cooked a doughnut. So, trust me on this one… if I can do it, you can too.

Now, hopefully you are saying… gimme, gimme, gimme! I’m afraid a little patience is going to be called for. The book is still in the works, and won’t be available until fall of 2010. Right now, I’m just putting the finishing touches on the recipes, and making sure that they all work, flawlessly, when I’m not the one cooking them. For that, I’m looking for recipe testers. Are you interested? Then find out more here.

I’ll be posting doughnut odds and ends here over the next year when the book is released, and then expect to see even more doughnut adventures… recipes that didn’t quite fit into the book, doughnut shops that I love, new and fun doughnut gadgets, doughnut tours and what not. I’d love to hear from you… about your favorite doughnut shops or recipes or stories!

-L
(BTW – If you don’t know who I am, you can find out more about me here.)