A few weeks back, we FINALLY tracked down a donut pan – at Michaels no less! I was thrilled, as were the kids, since I had been putting off making donuts for a while. Forming them by hand is ok, but they always ended up more like a bun than a warm, soft, yet chewy, delicious ring of sugary goodness. And ready in under an hour?! Hello! Sign me up!
Then, on the weekend, I discovered the 5 Minute Artisan Bread Brioche dough. It’s like an egg dough, you can make bread, rolls, cinnamon buns, and yes, we found, donuts from it! These aren’t your typical donuts, they’re more the “gourmet” bun style ones, yet so very delicious! And the possibilities for fillings are endless! We used homemade strawberry jam (with chia seeds :D), but you could use any kind of jam, caramel, chocolate fudge, fruit filling, custard, pudding….I could go on and on!
What’s your favourite donut filling? Mine – Definitely Boston Cream. Oh now I’m going to have to make these again, dipped in chocolate with custard in the middle….hmm, you could even make these mini and fill them with whipped cream, then freeze them like those giant buckets of pastries at Costco. Yummy!
To start with the donuts, you’ll need to make up a recipe of the 5 Minute Brioche dough. It needs to chill for a few hours before you use it, so make sure you are prepared for that in advance!
- 1 1/2 cups lukewarm water
- 1 tablespoon granulated yeast (1 packets)
- 1 to 1 1/2 tablespoons kosher salt
- 8 large eggs, lightly beaten
- 1/2 cup honey
- 1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter, melted (if you omit the salt, you could probably just use salted butter)
- 7 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
Mix the yeast, salt, eggs honey and melted butter with the water in a 5-quart bowl, or lidded (not airtight) food container.
Mix in the flour, using a spoon until all of the flour is incorporated.
Cover (not airtight), and allow to sit at room temperature for about two hours.
Baked Brioche Donuts
Take 1-2 pounds of the dough and divide into balls. Depending on how big you want your donuts to be, about mini donut (timbits here in Canada :D) size or else the size of a small bun.
Roll into a ball between the palms of your hands, then place on a parchment lined cookie sheet in a warm place to rise.
Let rise for 1-2 hours, until no longer feeling cold or nicely risen in size. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Once risen, bake for 10-15 minutes (might be less, might be longer, depending on the size of the donuts and your oven) or until lightly browned. Let cool.
After the donuts cool, take a paring knife (I used a grapefruit knife) and insert into the middle of each donut.
Jiggle the knife back and forth, up and down, to create a nice cavity to put the filling into.
Using a pastry bag fitted with a straight tip, insert into donut and fill it with your filling. Move the tip up and down and around, shake the donut a bit to get it well filled, and once it oozes out the opening, you’re done!
Set it down and do the next one. C’mon, set it down. I know it’s calling your name. PUT DOWN THAT DONUT! Ok, never mind, just go ahead and eat it. Don’t worry, no one will know ;0)
