Jelly Filled Donuts

5th day of our Blogging Marathon and today I made some Jelly filled donuts for the little one (and for the adults too, of course). My son loves donuts from Dunkin Donuts (a very famous donut chain in the US), but we don't buy from there very often which is why my son craves for donuts once in a while. He'll ask me when I drop him off at daycare, "Are you going to bring me some donuts when you pick me up in the evening?". I usually end up giving him some excuses for not bring anything in the evening, but this time I promised him that I'll make some at home.

Recipe is from Vegetarian Times magazine and I had it bookmarked for quite sometime now. They are a little time consuming to make (takes about 3-4 hours including the rising time), but the end product is well worth the effort. These little muchkins are so cute that I couldn't help but pop at least 2 at every stage of making. They are quite addictive.

To make a little nutritious, I used 1 cup of whole-wheat pastry flour and no sugar added jelly to fill them.

Recipe adapted from Vegetarian Times Magazine.

Ingredients:

All purpose flour - 1½ cups
Whole-wheat pastry flour - 1 cup (or just use 2½cups All-purpose flour)

Yeast - 2¼ tsp (or 0.25oz sachet)

Sugar - ¼ cup plus 1 tsp, divided

Salt - 1 tsp

Baking powder - ½tsp

Nutmeg - ½tsp

Vegan margarine - 3tbsp, melted (I used Earth Balance vegan butter)

Superfine Sugar - ½cup (I ground regular sugar in the blender to get the superfine sugar)

Jelly/ Jam - ½ cup (I used seedless blackberry jam, but you can use any seedless jam/jelly, raspberry would be awesome too)

Method:

• Mix yeast, 1tsp sugar with 1 cup of warm water (110°F) in a measuring cup. Let stand for 5 minutes or until the mixture is frothy and smells yeasty.
• Whisk together flours, remaining sugar, salt, baking powder and nutmeg in a large bowl. Grease separate bowl with oil.
• Stir yeast mixture into flour mixture with a wooden spoon until sticky dough forms. Add up to ¼ cup warm water to make smooth dough.
  
• Stir in the melted margarine.
• Dough is very soft and sticky at this stage. Turn it onto a well floured surface and knead for 6-8 minutes using extra flour as kneaded, until the dough is soft, smooth and pliable.
• Transfer to the oiled bowl, cover with plastic wrap or towel and let rise in a warm place for 1½ hours.
  
• Flour a baking sheet. Roll the dough into ¼" thick round on a well-floured surface. Cut into circles using 2" round cutter and place them on the floured baking sheet. (I used the lid of a Bru bottle as my cutter.) Loosely cover with plastic wrap and let rest for 15 minutes.

• Heat oil until hot but not smoking. Fry donuts in oil for 3-5 minutes, or until deep golden brown on all sides, flipping 2-3 times. Drain on paper-towel lined baking sheet.

• Roll the donuts while still warm in superfine sugar. Cool.

• Poke small hole in side of each donut with a toothpick or a skewer. Using a pastry bag fitted with small round tip, fill each donut with 1tsp of jam/jelly.

Don't forget to check out what the other Marathoners are cooking up in their kitchens.

Azeema, Bhagi, Champa, Sowmya, Gayathri Anand, Gayathri Kumar, Harini, Jay, Kamalika, Mina, Meena, Padma, PJ, Priya Mahadevan, PriyaSuresh, PriyaVaasu, Rujuta, Saraswathi, Savitha, Shanavi, Smitha, Srivalli, Suma,Usha,Veena.