Going nuts for doughnuts

Sure, St. Louis is known for things like gooey butter cakes, fried ravioli, and so on, but to me there will always be something else that stands out.  Granted you can find it anywhere pretty much, but it's home to me and was part of my childhood.  My grandmother would visit two of the local bakeries and get different things, bread, coffee cake, but the one that we all wanted was the sugar doughnut holes.  Little, simple, but so good.

When I realized I wanted a bakery, I knew I had to have doughnuts in some form.  Well, not any form.  Honestly, I wanted what I grew up with.  But, like many others, I thought it'd be more work than it's worth, and you have to deal with hot oil and frying them.  It'd be much easier to just do a baked doughnut.  It's not the same though.

I went online and looked up recipes and found some that had pretty good reviews and that gave me a place to start with.  I made my first batch, and it was great and the people I shared them with loved them as well.

So, I was sitting here earlier today thinking about what I could do for a topic and I was like "Duh, doughnuts."  and here we go...

In terms of ingredients, it's pretty simple and straight forward for a "basic" doughnut - flour, sugar, eggs, milk, ect.  The original recipe called for vegetable shortening, but I replace it with butter.  It makes it sound better to me and more appetizing than saying 'There's crisco in this!'

To start off, put the milk and butter in a small pot and heat until the butter is melted and small bubbles form around the edge of the pot.   Remove the pot from the heat and let it cool slightly. While the milk is heating up, mix the warm water, yeast and teaspoon of sugar in a bowl and let it sit for 5-10 minutes until foamy.

 Put the yeast mixture into a mixing bowl, add the remaining sugar, salt and the cooled milk mixture and stir to dissolve the sugar.  Add one cup of flour and the eggs and mix.  Gradually mix in the remaining flour to form a soft dough.

Continue beating the dough until it pulls away from the edge of the bowl.  You can either remove the dough and continue kneeding by hand or kneed it in the bowl for 2-3 minutes until it is smooth and elastic.

Transfer the dough to a clean bowl, which has been lightly greased, and let the dough rise in a warm area for 1 - 1 1/2 hours until roughly doubled.

Punch down the dough and place in a lightly floured surface and roll out into a 1/2 inch thick sheet.

Cut out the doughnuts into whatever shape/size you desire.  Place onto baking sheets and let rise for 40 minutes to 1 hour, until they have puffed up roughly doubled in size.

Heat oil in a deep fryer or large sauce pan to 350 degrees.  It's important to have it at this temperature, if it's too cool the doughnuts will absorb the oil...too hot and well, figure that one out.

Working in small batches, carefully place the doughnuts into the hot oil and cook on one side for 30 seconds to 1 minute, when they have a golden color to them, and flip to the other side to continue cooking.

Transfer the doughnuts to a wire wrack to drain and cool.

While the doughnuts are still warm, place in sugar and toss to coat.  Then try to not eat one, I dare you.

1/2 cup warm water (100 to 110 degrees F/40 to 45 degrees C)

2 (.25 ounce) packages active dry yeast

1 teaspoon white sugar

3/4 cup milk, lukewarm

1/3 cup vegetable shortening

1/4 cup white sugar

1 teaspoon salt

2 eggs

4 cups sifted all-purpose flour

2 quarts vegetable oil for frying

DIRECTIONS:

Pour 1/2 cup of warm water into a small bowl, and stir in the yeast and 1 teaspoon of sugar. Allow the yeast mixture to stand until it forms a creamy foam layer on top, 5 to 10 minutes.

Place milk and vegetable shortening into a small saucepan over medium-low heat and cook until the shortening has melted and the milk has tiny bubbles around the edge. Remove from heat.

Place 1/4 cup of sugar and the salt into the work bowl of a large stand mixer and pour the milk and shortening into the bowl. Mix on low speed just to dissolve sugar; and allow mixture to stand until warm.

Beat in the yeast mixture, eggs, and 1 cup of flour on low speed until smooth. Gradually beat in remaining flour to make a soft dough.

Continue beating the dough on low speed until dough leaves the sides of the bowl, 2 to 3 minutes.

Turn the dough out onto a well-floured work surface and knead until smooth and elastic, 2 or 3 more minutes.

Form the dough into a ball and place into a large greased bowl. Grease the top of the dough, and cover the bowl with waxed paper. Set the bowl into a warm place; let the dough rise until doubled in size, 1 to 1 1/2 hours.

Punch down the dough and roll out on a floured work surface to 1/2 inch thick. Cut doughnuts out of the dough with a 3 1/2-inch round doughnut cutter with a 1-inch smaller cutter in the center. Let the doughnuts rise on the work surface until very light and fluffy, 40 minutes to 1 hour.

Heat oil in a deep-fryer or large saucepan to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).

Gently pick up and drop the doughnuts into the hot oil, working in small batches of 2 or 3 at a time, and cook until the doughnuts are light golden brown, turning once, about 2 minutes.

Drain the doughnuts on paper towels to absorb oil.