You can never have too many donut recipes, am I right?
Even though I already have an amazing natural sourdough yeast donut recipe. (Yes, they’re amazing, in case you were wondering.), I’ve decided what this blog needs is another great donut recipe. One for those who don’t happen to have a sourdough starter growing in their fridge.
So, today’s recipe is a bit different. Instead of using natural sourdough as a leavening, rising agent, in this recipe we use store bought yeast, and start the recipe with a little soaking time to break down the anti-nutrients that naturally exist in whole-wheat. By soaking, you not only make the whole-wheat more digestible, you also “lighten” the flavor, making your donuts fluffy & delicious, as all donuts should be.
Most “healthy” donut recipes would have you bake your donuts. This is also known as, “making donuts taste like poo”. I’m sorry, but when I make donuts, I mean to make the real deal, none of this baking business. The good news is that you can use high-quality traditional fats when you fry your donuts, thereby making them delicious AND nutritious.
Happiness for everybody!
Avoid using a poor-quality oil like Crisco, corn oil, canola oil, vegetable oil, peanut oil, or grapeseed oil, which are all too high in poly-unsaturated fats. Poly-unsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) contain compounds that are instantly rancid, inflammatory, and dangerous to our health. Because every single cell in our bodies primarily use saturated & mono-unsaturated fats, we need to focus on getting a higher amount of those, and a lesser amount of PUFAs.
Think traditional.
Before our ancestors were introduced to the factory-made PUFA fats, (like the ones I listed above), their fats were mostly obtained through butter, bacon, lard, tallow, coconut oil, & olive oil. These all happen to have perfect saturated, mono-unsaturated, & poly-unsaturated levels. Perfect for our cells, perfect in their simple nature. It all goes back to the rule that if it can ONLY be made in a factory, it ain’t natural. Our ancestors didn’t get cancer, didn’t have diabetes, & lived as long as we do today without modern medicine all while eating a perfect balance of naturally existing fats, carbs, & protein.
If you’re a bit in shock when I suggest that lard is actually healthy, head on over and read my previous article called, The TOP 3 reasons why YOU should be eating Lard. (Of course, when I say “lard”, I mean lard only from healthy, foraged, living in the fresh air pigs, NOT from feedlots)
Fun Fact: This recipe is very similar to my homemade soaked bread recipe. The difference is that we’ve added a sweetener in the beginning, and reduced the flour amount, so the dough is a little more sticky. Remember, “the stickier the dough, the lighter the roll!”
Homemade Healthy Donuts!
Serves your whole family, plus some neighbors (which basically means this makes a lot of donuts. Go big or go home, I guess) But seriously, about 3 dozen donuts roughly.
Ingredients:
3 c. warm filtered water
2 TBS. apple cider vinegar
6 c. whole-wheat flour
1/2 c. unrefined cane sugar or coconut sugar
1/4 c. water
2 heaping tsp. instant yeast
2 TBS. unrefined cane sugar or coconut sugar
2 tsp. salt
Arrowroot starch for dusting counter top
1-2 c. coconut oil for frying
Directions:
1. In a large bowl, mix flour & sugar. In a small bowl, mix water with apple cider vinegar.
2. Add the water/apple cider mixture to your dry ingredients.
3. Cover with a greased saran wrap and leave on your counter top about 12-24 hours.
4. After 12-24 hours, place your dough in a warm oven for about 15 minutes. (This helps it rise better once we add the yeast)
5. While the dough is warming, in a small bowl, mix water, yeast, & sugar. After 5 minutes, when the yeast has “proofed” or produced foamy bubbles, add to your dough and knead in with your hands.
6. Add salt and knead that in as well.
7. Cover the bowl again with saran wrap, and place in a warm oven for about 30 minutes to rise.
8. After 30 minutes, heavily dust a counter top with arrowroot powder and roll out your dough with a rolling pin. You can use this handy doughnut cutter to shape them.
9. Heat your oil to about 350 degrees, and place donuts in, frying in about 1 1/2 – 2 minutes on each side. Remove from the oil when it is slightly brown. Be careful not to burn them donuts. That would be a travesty!
For the Glaze, simply warm 1/4 c. milk over low heat, then add 1 tsp. of vanilla and 1 1/2 cups of organic powdered sugar. These donuts don’t need that much glaze, so just lightly dip each one in, no need to drench it in glaze or anything:)
This came out soupy for me, too. What went wrong? I woke up early so I could have these made and can’t run my blender to grind more flour without waking up the whole house. Definitely looks like it needs more flour though. Please, review the recipe and fix the amount. There has to be an error somewhere with most of us getting soupy dough. Thank you.
Hi Kelli-
The way the dough turns out often depends on how recently your flour was milled. A freshly milled flour will have more air in it, and in weight, be less than used in the recipe. Do add more flour next time and hopefully it will not be soupy. Thank you -Bobbi (DaNelle’s Assistant)
Please update this recipe, I followed the recipe exactly and it was soupy too!
Mine came out soupy as well 🙁 I added another cup this morning before warming in the oven to rise. Hopefully that helps! DaNelle, would you make a video of you making these please?
has anyone tried avocado oil for frying donuts? i bought some at costco and tried it and loved not having a coconut flavor in the donuts..not my fav..also seemed to smell better as the oil heated up
DaNelle,
When I read what you wrote about canola oil making everything taste rancid, I knew EXACTLY what you were sayin’. I use canola oil instead of margarine in my mom’s favorite gingerbread recipe thinking it was SO MUCH healthier, right? Wrong! Amazingly, the cookies tasted stale even after one day! ONE DAY! I will now try to reformulate the recipe to include either lard and/or butter. Thank you for the real foods epiphany. I came to the same conclusion about all these bazaar health crazes, and now I completely understand that the more processed a food is, the crappier it is for you. Thanks for confirming that I’m not crazy, well, mostly not crazy. About fat being actually good for you, I mean. = S
Can I bake these in the oven?
I just finished printing this recipe for my folder.
I love home made Donuts, and these sound delicious.
Thanks for sharing and for showing us pictures of what it is supposed to look like as we go thru the process of making them
I used this recipe but only did half. Turned out awesome!
Do you use refined coconut oil or extra virgin? I’ve been using refined when I do fry because it’s soooo much cheaper and is tasteless. I guess I’m looking for affirmation that it’s ok to use a refined oil!
I am really curious about this too. I used the extra virgin coconut oil and when I heated it to the 350º it started to burn (the oil burned,smoked, and turned brown). So I had to add sunflower oil to the mix. Sounds like it would be better to use refined coconut oil!
This did not work at all! Final dough product was like soup. The ratio of flour to water is way off.
Mmm! These look delicious. Me and my sister wanted to make donuts for our father’s birthday (17th) for breakfast, but don’t have the right tools for frying (we are on vacation)… We have an oven though, so we thought about baking them instead, with perhaps a thick dough and a piping bag. What do you think? Would it turn out fine?
Thank you!
I made this but it wasn’t like bread dough more of a soupy mixture. I had to add flour the next day to even get a soft dough. Maybe different types of wheat produce different results. I used fresh ground Maine wheat. I did add chopped apples to the final dough to make apple fritters though and they were chewy but tasted yummy.
That looks like breakfast tomorrow. I mixed it really good but it doesn’t look like yours…but I am very excited to see how this Not-A-Morning-Person fares. Looking forward to a breakfast my junk loving hubby will love.
So excited to try these! I’ve been searching for a soaked donut recipe that doesn’t involve buying some sort of shaped donut baking pan. Do I need a fryer to cook these in though or can I just do it in really hot grease on the stovetop?