Baked Donut Update 2

To continue my Baked Donut Project update from yesterday, I continue with the Dark Chocolate Espresso Bean Donuts and the Pumpkin Donuts.

Based off of the original VeganYumYum vanilla base, I added in dark chocolate coffee beans. I had these dark chocolate espresso beans from Trader Joe's and chopped them in my spice/coffee bean grinder.

I ended up with kind of a dark chocolate dust, dark chocolate bits, and espresso bean bits. This I blended into the batter, with some leftover. After baking, I melted the remaining dark chocolate dust (with espresso bean remnants) and used that as the frosting. Like last time, I frosted with my pastel sprinkles.

Normal vanilla-nutmeg donuts (top left). Dark ChocoCoffee Bean (bottom right).
Basic and Dark ChocoCoffee Bean frosted with sprinkles.

 As you can tell from the picture, the addition of the dark choco-coffee bean bits made the donuts crumbly. This also could have resulted from me leaving the batter in open air on the countertop as I waited for the first batch of regular donuts to bake. The batter could have dried, losing the moisture it needs to stick together during baking. Next time, gotta cover and refrigerate batter.

20 mini donuts for enjoyment ^_^

What I like to do when I bake my donuts, is leave it in the oven for 6 min, then turn the pan around and bake for another 6-7 minutes, just to ensure even browning, since my oven is tiny! It's like a third the size of my oven bake home. So, I have to make my donuts in two batches - which works because I only have one donut pan, but I could do stuff in my multiple mini cupcake pans.

Next up are the pumpkin donuts, of whose flavor is the quintessential, nearly hackneyed predilection of foodies and bloggers during the fall season. For this one, I did not use VeganYumYum's recipe, but based it off this one: Gluten-Free Pumpkin Spice Donuts. Again, I did not make it vegan, nor gluten-free. I used all-purpose flour, a blend of white and brown sugar, butter, and a blend of pumpkin puree, soymilk, and frozen yogurt.

Some frosted, some not.

Such good texture...*drool*

 The results were fantastic. I loved just munching on them without frosting (a general statement for all the donuts I've been making). Frosting for me is purely for decoration purposes; I'd rather eat the cake in all its normal, not overly sweet euphoria.

Puffed up in the pan, hot and toasty!

 Yup, so that pretty much sums up my donut project so far. Every time I make some, I give some to my housemates and then to my friends at UC Berkeley. I even called up my old roommates to meet them on campus and extend some yummy baked donut love.

It's always good to share (but of course save some for meself too! ;-P )

In the meantime, I've cooked a few random things and made an impromptu pumpkin pie which I'll post up soon too.