Classic Sugar Ring Dougnuts
things are better when deep fried
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It’s not often that I’ll deep fry food. Not for any reason remotely related to health but mainly because of the effort, or at least perceived effort it requires. And hot oil can be a little scary. I love eating deep fried foods - fries, crispy fried chicken, churros, calamari and pretty much anything that’s been battered. I just don’t want to be the one doing the frying. Using and getting rid of all the oil is a bit of a faff, there are splatters all over the cooker and the smell lingers around the whole house for ages. This week however, the craving I had for fresh doughnuts was so intense, all my dislike for frying went out of the window and I have no regrets.
Doughnuts, quite literally, come in all shapes and sizes and as much as I love a filled doughnut, (always with custard), what was really on my mind this week was a simple, classic ring doughnut. No frills, no glazes, no extravagant toppings. Just a good bit of fried sugary dough. Plus, when you make ring doughnuts, you get the added bonus of doughnut holes! Two in one!
For my base dough, I’ve enriched it with eggs, milk and butter. I’ve eaten some fantastic brioche doughnuts that use a higher ratio of eggs and butter and have a beautifully light, almost fluffy texture but that’s not what I was going for here. I wanted that breadiness, that gentle chew, that soft, just sweet enough dough. To achieve that, most of the work is in the kneading stage with the development of the gluten strands. I used a stand mixer for this and it took about 15 minutes of mixing to get a dough that was incredibly silky and elastic. Is it possible to make by hand? Of course! You’ll just need lots of patience and strong arms. But it’s doable.
You can use this recipe as a base and make filled doughnuts if you prefer. The only thing that changes is that you don’t cut out a hole in the middle. Once fried, dust them in sugar and pipe in your filling once cool.
SUGARED RING DOUGHNUTS
