Baked Cinnamon Doughnuts
These Baked Cinnamon Doughnuts are the perfect way to start your weekend with a cup of coffee or as an afternoon treat.
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Oven baked treats
There are lots of reasons why I love to make these baked cinnamon doughnuts. Because they are baked they are made with a batter more like that of a cake than a bread like dough. This means that they are light and bouncy with a moist crumb. They avoid the mess of deep fat frying and it’s so much easier to tell that they are cooked all the way through.
And, of course one benefit of this recipe is that baked cinnamon doughnuts are healthier than the deep fried variety. Do you need any more reasons to make them?
But, what I really love most about this recipe is that it is incredibly versatile. With this basic recipe you can change the flavours and decorate them how you want.
The doughnuts themselves are the perfect balance of sweet and savoury and the nutmeg gives them a real warming, hearty flavour. They are also the perfect texture: light and fluffy. Rolling them in cinnamon sugar straight after the come out of the oven gives them the hit of sweetness that you crave when you wake up after a long lie in. The perfect lazy day breakfast. Hot mug of coffee optional!
How to make Baked Cinnamon Doughnuts
These are baked cinnamon doughnuts which means rather than being made from a dough, they are made from a thick batter.
Making this batter is easy.
In a large bowl you combine all of the dry ingredients and in a jug you combine all of the wet ingredients (this includes the melted butter and the seeds from a vanilla pod.)
Having whisked the wet ingredients together they are stirred into the dry ingredients creating a batter similar to that of a cake.
To transfer the batter into the tins (which will need to have been greased with a little oil) I fill an icing bag and cut off the end. This allows you to pipe neat rings of the batter directly into the doughnut pan.
Once you’ve done this all that is left to do is to bake them in the oven for 15 minutes. After this time they will be springy to the touch and will be a welcoming golden brown colour.
Prepare a plate with the cinnamon sugar and tip them out directly into it. This will help the cinnamon sugar to stick.
Transfer the coated doughnuts on to a wire rack to cool before eating.
How to make Baked Cinnamon Doughnuts vegan
Depending on your preferred ingredient, making these baked cinnamon doughnuts vegan is surprisingly easy.
For the milk use soya milk, for the yogurt use a plain plant based yogurt and for the butter use margarine or a block like Flora Plant Based B+tter or Naturli.
For the eggs I like to use a powedered egg replacer when I can. You add this to the dry ingredients and the liquid then activates it as the batter is mixed together. Always make sure you follow the instructions on the packet, but my preferred brand says to use 1 tsp for every egg you are replacing.
You could also use apple sauce or mashed banana in this recipe. 125g of applesauce or 1 mashed banana will do the trick for this recipe.
For more information about making plant based substitutions to baking recipes, check out the big vegan baking guide.
Baked doughnut variations
Although I’ve made these doughnuts with nutmeg and sugar in the batter and a cinnamon sugar coating, you can mix and match the spices or even add cocoa powder to the batter.
When it comes to decorating them you can use a royal icing glaze in a range of colours with wonderful multi-coloured sprinkles to match. A chocolate ganache also works really well, with chocolate shavings or even a sprinkling of tiny fudge squares forming a halo around the top.
The recipe
Baked Cinnamon Doughnuts
Equipment
- 2 6 holed doughnut pan alternatively use 1 and bake in 2 batches
Ingredients
For the doughnuts
- 300 grams plain flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 150 grams caster sugar
- 1 tsp ground nutmeg
- 75 grams butter melted
- 225 ml milk
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp nutmeg
- 1 vanilla pod seeds only
For the coating
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 100 grams caster sugar
Instructions
- Pre-heat the oven to 180C / 350F / gas mark 4.
- Grease your tins with a little vegetable oil and place to one side.
- In a large bowl you combine all of the dry ingredients and in a jug combine all of the wet ingredients (this includes the melted butter and the seeds from a vanilla pod.)
- Whisk the wet ingredients together then fold into the dry ingredients creating a batter.
- To transfer the batter into the tins fill an icing bag with the butter and cut off the end. This allows you to pipe neat rings of the batter directly into the doughnut pan. (Alternatively carefully fill the rings with a spoon). The rings should be 3/4 full.
- Once you’ve done this all that is left to do is to bake them in the oven for 15 minutes. After this time they will be springy to the touch and will be a welcoming golden brown colour.
- Prepare a plate with a mix of the sugar and cinnamon and tip them out directly into it. This will help the cinnamon sugar to stick.
- Transfer the coated doughnuts on to a wire rack to cool before eating.
Nutrition
More doughnut recipes
What type of doughnuts are your favourite?
Wow these look amazing! I hate deep frying too, there’s so much mess and grease!
Awww thank you 🙂 I’m glad I’m not the only one!!!
I’m going to have to give these a go during half term. I’m presuming you can freeze the surplus and defrost?
I’m going to have to give these a go this week. I’m presuming the surplus could be frozen and defrosted?
I haven’t tried freezing either the batter or the finished doughnuts. I’d try freezing them once baked! Let me know how it goes 🙂
I love that these doughnuts are baked and not fried! Sounds like a simple delicious recipe! And I love your photography 🙂
Thank you so much! 🙂 your comments really mean a lot. We can totally pretend they are healthy coz they are baked. One of our five a day? Hahaha xx
Wow wow wow wow wow! These look like the perfect doughnuts – I love that you baked them, that’s such an amazing idea! I love the flavour of cinnamon in anything sweet, and they are one of my favourite additions to add to doughnuts, delicious 🙂
Thanks harrietemilys. What a lovely comment to receive 🙂 I’m glad you like them!!! Sounds like these are perfect for you. You will have to give them a go and send me pictures 😀 I’d love to see you make them x
These look amazing!! Gorgeous pictures and lovely doughnuts. I like them best baked, too.
Thanks Katie! I really appreciate your comments – I’ve been working really hard to improve the photos so I’m glad you like them. You should definitely give these a try 😀 If you liked baked doughnuts you’ll adore these xx
They look gorgeous! I’m more into those “no-frying” kind of doughnuts 🙂
Thanks Sylvia 😀 I think if you can avoid all that grease and still make some that tastes awesome you’d be made not to 🙂 xx
These look amazing. Trust me you are not alone with your fear of deep frying, really would just rather not!
It seems quite a few people agree with me about deep frying who would’ve thought :-p I better get making more baked doughnut recipes! Thanks Eleanor!