Skinnified Sunday: Birthday Cake Donuts

Okay, first of all I’m not sure if I’m supposed to spell it ‘doughnut’ or ‘donut’.

Donut has less letters, but doughnut sounds kind of fancy.

And I ask you this: How can there be two correct spellings of the same word???? My type A brain can’t handle it.

Anyway, I made do(ugh)nuts! Fancy, sprinkly, festive, birthday cake do(ugh)nuts!

Yes, sprinkly is a word. It’s a synonym for fancy.

I found a super easy, and already light-ish recipe for cake doughnuts from All Recipes that I only had to slightly modify to get a pretty darn healthy, delicious, and festive looking do(ugh)nut.

My Swaps:

• ½ recipe (-temptation, the last thing I need is a dozen donuts sitting around)
• white whole wheat flour for all-purpose (+protein, +fiber)
• turbinado sugar/Splenda combo for white sugar (-sugar, -calories, and using all natural turbinado sugar makes me feel a little better about the Splenda—it’s all about balance, right?)
• all cinnamon for cinnamon and nutmeg (personal preference)
• unsweetened vanilla almond milk for regular (-fat, -calories, -sugar)
• egg substitute for whole egg (-fat, -saturated fat, -calories, -cholesterol)
• extra vanilla (I just really like it)
• light whipped butter for shortening (-fat, -saturated fat, -trans fat, -calories)

Birthday Cake Donuts

Yield 6 donuts

Yes, I like it spelled donuts. 😉

• 1 cup white whole wheat flour
• ¼ cup + 2 tbsp turbinado sugar
• 1 tsp baking powder
• pinch cinnamon
• dash salt
• ¼ cup + 2 tbs unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• ¼ cup egg substitute
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• ½ tbs light whipped butter, softened

For the glaze:

• ½ cup powdered sugar
• dash almond extract
• 1-2 tbs hot water
• sprinkles for topping (optional)

**Note: If you are in the anti Splenda club, just user all turbinado sugar. We don’t need to get hateful about it 😉

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325. Spray a donut pan with nonstick spray, and set aside.
2. In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together flour, salt, baking powder, sugar, Splenda and cinnamon.
3. Using a hand mixer, beat in all remaining ngredients (excluding those for the glaze) until just combined.
4. Transfer batter to a plastic freezer bag, and cut a small hole in the corner.
5. Evenly divide batter between 6 donut forms.
6. Bake for 8-10 minutes, then let stand for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
7. Meanwhile, in a small-medium mixing bowl, whisk together powdered sugar, almond extract and 1 tbs hot water. Slowly continue to add more water (and I mean very slowly. A little bit of liquid goes a long way with powdered sugar) until desired drippy consistency.
8. Dip tops of donuts into the glaze, then let stand on a flat surface. Top with sprinkles if desired.