Day of Doughnuts

I started yesterday by making these:

Frying them in this:

Cooling them on paper towels:

Shaking them - one at a time - in a sack (I double-bagged it)  of cinnamon and sugar:

Ta-da!

A basketful of doughnuts and doughnut holes:

I ended my day doing this AGAIN:

Lesson learned:  No need to double the recipe!

Oops!  Forgot to give this one a hole:

There!  Much better!

A second basketful:

I finished up by writing some notes in my cookbook.  Do you write comments in your cookbooks?  I highly recommend the practice.  The notes are so useful when you come back to the recipe again.  (The star means this recipe is a keeper.)

The recipe came from this cookbook:

I tried to find a link for it on their website, but there was not an exact match, so here's the recipe (slightly adapted by me), if you are inclined to try it.

Cake Doughnuts (makes around 24 doughnuts)

2 eggs 

1 cup buttermilk (I used plain yogurt)

1 cup brown sugar

3 Tbsp. melted butter

1 cup whole wheat flour 

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. cinnamon

1/4 tsp. nutmeg

Beat the eggs with buttermilk until light.  Add and beat in the sugar and butter.  Mix the rest of the ingredients together in a separate bowl.  Add to the liquid, beating until just mixed (don't overdo it).

Turn the sticky dough out onto a well-floured board.  With a well-floured rolling pin roll the dough out to between 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick.  Cut with a doughnut cutter and allow them to rest while you heat either vegetable oil (what I used) or lard or shortening to 365ºF.  The oil should be deep enough so the doughnuts can float (between an inch and two inches).

Add the doughnuts to the hot oil, a few at a time.  Cook a minute or so til the bottom half is golden, then flip them (use a slotted spoon or metal tongs) and brown the other side.  Remove them to a paper towel to drain.

In the meantime, take two paper sacks and put one inside the other.  Put 3/4 cup of sugar and 2 tsp. cinnamon in the bag.  Make sure they are mixed well together.  After the doughnuts are cool enough to handle, put them one at a time into the sack and give them a good shake to coat them with the cinnamon and sugar.  Take them out of the bag and put them in a towel-lined basket.  Now they are ready to eat!