The Baked Bite: Apple Cider Doughnuts
After several weeks of not drinking alcohol because I was recovering from a surgery, I spent most of last weekend preparing and then enjoying mulled wine as I watched my favorite holiday movies. I had never made mulled wine before - and in fact, I had only ever tasted the drink a few years ago, when I traveled to Vienna around Christmastime. However, after making it last weekend, I realize how easy it is to prepare and how cozy and Christmas-ey it makes your home (and your tastebuds!) feel. There are tons of great recipes online for mulled wine - here, for example - and I highly recommend checking them out.
This post is not about mulled wine, however. Rather, I’m going to encourage you to make homemade apple cider doughnuts, which I only decided to make because I had about half a jug of apple cider left over in my fridge from the aforementioned mulled wine extravaganza. I went to high school in Connecticut, and despite being a California girl, autumn in the northeast has a special place in my heart. Apple cider doughnuts may or may not be a big reason for that.
I did a quick search for apple cider doughnut recipes on Google - and I settled on one from The Spruce Eats that seemed relatively simple and called for ingredients that I had on hand. I highly encourage you all to try this recipe. They would be a great Christmas morning breakfast treat, or something to soak up the champagne post New Years!
If you do try this recipe, here are a few extra pointers:
First, I highly recommend investing in a spider strainer if you do any kind of frying at home. It makes it MUCH easier to place things into the hot oil and then to remove them. I use this one.
Second, most recipes for fried food call for vegetable oil - such as canola or peanut. I prefer using avocado oil or coconut oil, or a mix of the two, since the oils are better for you overall than typical vegetable oil. They are more expensive, however. You can reuse frying oil by straining it through a fine sieve once it cools and then storing it in the fridge in an airtight container, which helps offset the more expensive price of avocado and coconut oil.
Third, you can definitely use alternative sweeteners if you do not want to use classic granulated sugar in the recipe. I used Classic monkfruit sweetener and it worked great.
Finally, if you do not have buttermilk, just combine 1/2 cup of whole milk with 1/2 tbsp vinegar or lemon juice, and allow the mixture to sit for 10-15 minutes. This method is an easy way to make buttermilk when you have none sitting around!
