Call me weird, but whenever I want to make pumpkin donuts, I never make the dough just for doughnuts. You see, yeast donuts never taste great the next day, and nobody needs to eat 30 doughnuts in one sitting!! (Although you might want too. . .this chai glaze is seriously addicting.. . .anyway.)
So in our house, I always make enough bread dough for 2 loaves of bread, plus something else. Usually it’s a small batch of cinnamon buns, sometimes it’s elephant ears (fried bread sprinkled with sugar), and this fall, it’s doughnuts.
Growing up, I always thought that donuts were some crazy-complicated thing. Whenever my family made them, it seemed like some giant production with lots of oil and icing and sprinkles and it took forever. Now that I’m older, I realize that it’s really not that hard. If you can bake bread and fry something in a frying pan, you can make doughnuts.
I personally don’t fry them in a deep fryer or in a pan with lots of oil. I fry mine in a regular frying pan with about 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch layer of oil, then just flip them when they get golden brown. It worked great and didn’t waste as much oil.
This easy pumpkin donut recipe is based off of my Pumpkin Bread Recipe. In fact, I recommend you stick most of the dough in some bread pans, and only use a third of it to make doughnuts, unless you’re making them for a large crowd. The amount of glaze in the recipe is meant for just that size–not the full loaf.
Doughnuts taste best fresh, so try and serve them within two hours or so of making them if you can. However, they will still taste great for up to 24 hours, but they will be tougher.
What if I don’t have a donut hole cutter or pan?
No sweat! I made this short little video to show you an easy hack for making fairly smooth looking donuts with just your hands.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy this easy pumpkin donuts with chai glaze recipe. Let me know if you tried them in the comments!
Pumpkin Doughnuts with Chai Glaze
A fun treat for family and friends when you're making bread.
Ingredients
- For the Bread & Doughnut Dough:
- 2 cups pumpkin puree
- 1 cup water
- 1 Tbsp yeast
- 1 Tbsp white sugar
- 2 eggs
- 5 cups flour
- 1/4 cup oil
- 1/2 Tsp salt
- 1 Tbsp cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp nutmeg
- For the Chai Glaze:
- 1/2 cup icing sugar
- 1 tea bag of chai tea. (I love PC Chocolatey Chai)
- 2 Tbsp cream. Whipping cream is best, but any percent will do.
Instructions
1. Set out one cup of warm water and dissolve sugar. Add yeast and let sit 10 minutes.
2. Add pumpkin puree, eggs and oil then stir. Add in salt and 2 cups flour, then mix with your dough hook. Keep adding in flour until your dough forms a ball. Usually 5 cups, but depending on the humidity it can take as little as 4 1/2 and as much as 6.
3. Grease a clean bowl, put in dough, cover with a clean towel, and set to rise in warm place. Once it has doubled (anywhere from an hour to 2 hours depending on the humidity that day), punch down and divide into 3 portions--one for the doughnuts and two that will go into two greased bread pans.
4. Let the bread rise until it reaches the top of the pan. In the meantime, here are the doughnut instructions.
5. Divide up the remaining dough into 8 equal sized balls. Smooth them out as shown in the video and poke a hole in them with your fingers, stretching out the dough into a donut shape.
6. Heat a frying pan filled with 1/2 inch to 3/4 inch of oil. When it is hot (you can put in a wooden chopstick to test it. If bubbles come up, the oil is ready), fry the doughnuts, about a minute and a half on each side, or when each side is golden brown. Set on paper towel to cool.
7. Rip the chai tea bag open and mix ingredients for the chai glaze. Dunk the donuts in it. Serve immediately.
8. Once the bread has risen, Bake in a 350 degree oven for 30-45 minutes, or until golden brown and hollow sounding when knocked.
9. Enjoy your pumpkin bread and donuts!
Notes
It is really important that you've read the post & recipe and understand that we're making both bread AND doughnuts.
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