Round and Holey Experimentation

Or in other words vegan, gluten-free, soy-free, milk-free, egg-free, corn-free doughnuts.

Yes, you read right. DOUGHNUTS.

My mother has a fabulous kitchen--marble countertops, smart stove, 1800 watt microwave oven, a Kitchenaid mixer, and a bunch of cool stuff that I've never been able to afford. On top of that, she also saved me a couple of issues of Living Without magazine. In one of these magazines was a recipe for awesome doughnuts. The fabulous kitchen and the fabulous recipe makes for an irresistible combination. So yeah. I made wicked doughnuts.

I haven't had doughnuts since, well, the vegan ones I found in Las Vegas when I was at Preston's wedding. But before then, it'd been YEARS. So I couldn't resist.

The recipe, since it's already gluten free, required very little in the way of modification.

Here's what I used:

1.25 cups white rice flour
1 cup granulated sugar
7/8 cup potato starch
1/2 cup tapioca starch
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon chickpea flour (you can use soy flour here if you're not allergic to soy like I am)
4 tsp xanthan gum (Stuff's expensive, yo!)
1 tsp salt
1.75 tsp baking powder (I found some that uses potato starch instead of corn starch!)
3 pkg instant dry yeast
1.25 cup warm almond milk (or whatever kind of milk turns you on)
12 tbs coconut oil (instead of the 1.5 sticks of butter it called for)
1 tbs Ener-G egg replacer
4 tbs warm water (The egg replacer and water are substituting for 2 large eggs)

Here's the story about the flour blend. Gluten-free flour mixes come in all kinds of mad scientist ways. Some use tapioca starch or flour. Some use arrowroot. Some use soy. Some use amaranth or quinoa. The trick is putting the flours together in a blend that works for what you're trying to bake. In this case, it uses a little bit of rice, potato, tapioca, and chickpea flours. The most expensive items were the xanthan gum (about $11 for a small package), and the coconut oil (which is a good substitute for butter since it's solid at normal room temp and melts at 76F).

How to cook it:

First I combined the dry ingredients: the rice flour, sugar, potato starch, tapioca starch, chickpea flour, xanthan bum, salt, baking powder, egg replacer, and dry yeast all went into a Kitchenaid-type mixer with a paddle attachment. Lightly mix until relatively uniform.

Then I put the coconut oil, warm water, and almond milk into a bowl and stuck it in the microwave to warm up the whole thing. I added the warm mixture to the flour mixture and let the mixer beat air into it for 5 minutes. In the meantime, let the oven warm slightly. After the mixer is done, put the bowl into the oven with an open door. This allows it to rise without baking it. Leave it there for 20 minutes.

The recipe calls for piping the doughnut batter in little circles onto squares of parchment paper using a cake decorating bag. I used the parchment paper for this, but it wasn't really necessary--you just need to pipe the rings onto something that you can move to and from a proofing area (like a microwave oven.) Once you're done piping, the doughnuts need to go into somewhere that's humid and warm. The recipe suggests boiling water in the microwave oven and putting the doughnuts there. And that's what I did. I let the doughnuts proof for about 20 minutes.

Put about 4 cups of oil or so into a deep fryer, pot, or pan. Heat oil to 350F (than goodness for my mom's candy thermometer!). Fry each side of the doughnut for a few minutes until brown.

Results:

I now have heartburn for eating so many so late in the evening, the evil things. The doughnuts turned out more like cake doughnuts than a yeast-risen doughnut, but it was very good. The coconut oil added a very coconutty flavor to it.

I also tried to make a chocolate glaze to dip the doughnuts in, but as soon as I added the cold almond milk, it solidified into hard little pieces and wouldn't melt smoothly anymore. Silly thing. So the glaze is more like a frosting. But it's all good.

No, I don't know the calorie and fat content of these. And I don't really WANT to know. I could figure it out if I really wanted to, but then I'd probably hate myself in the morning.

ETA: Morning after results: I was a little sloppy with how much coconut oil I put in, and it ended up being too much. It also could use a bit more sugar. Next time I make these I need to make sure I only put in the exact amount it calls for of coconut oil and put in some extra sugar.