Friday, September 18, 2015

Pancake-mIx Baked Donuts

My recipe makes 6 baked donuts, using pancake mix, water, and decorative sprinkles. Why only 6? Coz they're quicker to consume so that fewer might get stale. Also, good way to avoid overconsuming in a short time. Besides, I have only one 6-dunut pan and haven't felt inclined to acquire a second pan. Why baked? So you don't need to use a lot of oil and have a lot of it left over. Why pancake mix? For convenience of gathering and measuring fewer ingredients.

Initially, I had spotted an intriguing Parade Magazine recipe for baked donuts. After finding the online version, I googled other baked donut recipes. The Parade recipe started to lose its appeal—requirement of 9 items (too many for my taste), one being a different kind of flour than all-purpose. Turns out that many ingredients are used in pancakes.

I started googling for baked donuts that called for pancake mix. For my recipe, I inferred some processes, using minimal items. My pixstrip shows the following image areas:
  1. Implements
  2. Ingredients
  3. Bowl and mixing utensils used, batter in 6-donut pan
  4. Batter with sprinkles
  5. Baked donuts
  6. Donuts on plate, two cut open
Implements
  • Medium mixing bowl
  • Wire whip
  • Measuring cup for pancake powder
  • Measuring cup for water
  • Measuring spoons (just in case of needing any)
  • Spatula for scraping batter
  • 6-donut baking pan, available in crafts stores or online
Ingredients
  • 1 C pancake mix powder
  • 1 T sugar (Had omitted, but recommend, based on my outcome.)
  • 1/2 t vanilla (Had omitted, but recommend, based on my outcome.)
  • 2/3 C water
  • Sprinkles (nonpareils and jimmies shown)
  • Spray oil
Instructions
  1. Preheat the oven to 350°.
  2. Spray pan with oil, including the donut hole "posts".
  3. Stir pancake mix and water together in bowl.
  4. Dispense the batter evenly into the pan wells, about 1+ heaping tablespoon each.
  5. With finger, clear the batter off the "posts".
    Note: Several baked donut recipes say to pour the batter into a zipper bag and pipe into the wells.
  6. Sprinkle the decorations you want. (I sprinkled nonpareils in one row and jimmies in the other row.)
  7. With finger, clear the sprinkles off the "posts".
  8. Bake for about 15 minutes. Test for doneness with a toothpick.
  9. Note: If you're leery of raw batter spilling onto the oven, place a larger pan below the donut pan. In my case, the donuts did not spill over.
  10. Remove the donuts from the oven and let cool before using two spoons to lift and remove each from pan.
Post-recipe Thoughts
These donuts were less sweet than I expected, despite adding the sprinkles. One factor might be that I used buttermilk pancake mix instead of non-buttermilk. For future pancake-mix baked donuts, I would use non-buttermilk mix, add maybe an extra tablespoon of sugar, and add 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla.

As for the decorations, some nonpareils, because of their spheroid shape, tended to roll willy nilly when I didn't aim well as I shook them onto first row. I might use only jimmies for future batches, maybe measuring and stirring 2 tablespoons into the batter before dispensing into the wells.

Nutrition: Calories for each donut is about 90; sodium is about 200. Check out nutrition tables for Krispy Kreme and Duncan Donuts.

Cost considerations: My pancake powder cost less than $1.50 for 32 ounces (~7 1/2 cups), lots less expensive than scratch ingredients, and way less expensive than similar recipes using cake mix. This half-dozen donut batch cost about 20¢ (a smidge over 3¢ each). The decorations add a nit extra cost. (Consider how much convenient store-bought donuts cost these days.) If you don't have a donut pan, consider buying one and economize for future donuts.

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