These light and fluffy chocolate cake doughnuts are dipped in a vanilla glaze. These super moist doughnuts are so easy to make and are made without yeast. Plus, they only take 5 minutes to prepare and you don't need a mixer to make them!
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As much as I love fried doughnuts (like these brioche doughnuts with a chocolate filling) there is nothing better than a baked doughnut! Baked doughnuts are so much easier to make and are the perfect homemade treat.
Tell me about this recipe:
- These chocolate cake doughnuts are based off of my maple doughnuts. They're made with melted butter, buttermilk and light brown sugar.
- This recipe makes just 9 doughnuts, which I think is the perfect amount! You could double the ingredients if you want to make more for a crowd.
- Each doughnut is dipped in a homemade vanilla glaze.
Ingredients Needed
- Flour: I'm using all purpose flour for these baked doughnuts.
- Nutmeg: Adding a little bit of ground nutmeg will give you that bakery style doughnut taste
- Buttermilk: I love using buttermilk to make my donuts extra moist, but you can replace it with sour cream if you don't have buttermilk on hand
How to make this recipe
Step 1: Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. In a medium jug or bowl, whisk together all of the dry ingredients.
Step 2: In a small jug, whisk together your buttermilk, vanilla extract, egg and melted butter.
Step 3: Pour your wet ingredients into your dry and fold, making sure there are no flour pockets and the batter is smooth. Just note that this batter is quite thick!
Step 4: Grease your donut pan with butter or baking spray. I found the easiest way to fill the donut pan was to use a piping bag. I use a large circular tip and piped the batter into each cavity, filling it three quarters of the way. Use a small spoon or offset spatula to smooth the top and make it even. Bake for 11-13 minutes. They should be springy to the touch. Let them cool for 5 minutes before taking out each doughnut and letting it cool on a cooling rack. Regrease three of the cavities and pipe in the remaining batter, baking again.
Step 5: While your doughnuts are cooling, whisk together all of your glaze ingredients. If your glaze is too thick, you can add more milk. If your glaze is too thin, add more sifted confectioners' sugar.
Step 6: Dip each doughnut top into the vanilla glaze and place on a cooling rack set over a paper towel to dry.
Recipe Tips:
- I highly recommend using a weighing scale and measuring out your ingredients the metric way. It makes a huge difference to your baking and is the most accurate way to bake!
- I make sure that all of my ingredients are at room temperature before I start the recipe, so pull out all of the ingredients an hour or two before you start baking.
- Use a pastry brush to properly grease every donut cavity - this way no donut bits get stuck to them when baking! I use softened butter but you could also use a baking spray.
- I use a piping bag or ziplock bag with one corner cut off to pipe the donuts into the pan. You could also use a spoon to spoon out the batter but that might be a bit messier.
Try these doughnut recipes next!
Have you made this recipe? Make sure to tag me on Instagram @alpineella and leave a review below if you have! If you want more baking ideas, you can follow me on Pinterest.
Recipe
Baked Chocolate Cake Doughnuts
Equipment
- Doughnut Pan
Ingredients
Donuts
- 125 grams (1 cup) all purpose flour
- 25 grams (¼ cup) cocoa powder
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- 56 grams (4 tablespoons) unsalted butter melted and cooled
- 106 grams (½ cup) light brown sugar
- 113 ml (½ cup) buttermilk room temperature
- 1 egg room temperature
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ¼ teaspoon nutmeg optional
Vanilla Glaze
- 125 grams (1 cup) confectioners' sugar
- 2 tablespoon milk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- pinch salt
Instructions
Donuts
- Preheat oven to 350°F/175°C. Grease a donut pan with butter or baking spray. If you haven't already, melt your butter and then let it cool - you don't want to add hot butter to the batter!56 grams (4 tablespoons) unsalted butter
- Whisk together the flour, brown sugar, cocoa powder, nutmeg, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Combine buttermilk, egg, melted butter and vanilla extract.125 grams (1 cup) all purpose flour, 25 grams (¼ cup) cocoa powder, ½ tsp baking powder, ½ tsp baking soda, ½ tsp kosher salt, 56 grams (4 tablespoons) unsalted butter, 106 grams (½ cup) light brown sugar, 113 ml (½ cup) buttermilk, 1 egg, ¼ tsp nutmeg, 1 tsp vanilla extract
- Pour buttermilk mixture into dry mixture and fold in until all incorporated. Make sure there are no flour pockets.
- Pipe the batter into the cavities, filling each ¾ of the way. Bake for 11-13 minutes, until golden brown and springy to the touch. After 5 minutes take out each donut and let cool on a wire rack, before pouring the next batch in. I like the re-grease the pan before I refill it.
Vanilla Glaze
- Combine all ingredients together in a medium bowl until completely smooth. Dip each cooled doughnut in and let dry on a cooling rack above a paper towel.125 grams (1 cup) confectioners' sugar, 2 tbsp milk, 1 tsp vanilla extract, pinch salt
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JG says
I did try this recipe tonight. My husband loves chocolate and donuts so he asked me to make it. The US conversion does work. The dough looks a little thick when putting it in the donut pan but baked perfectly in 11 minutes for me. A note for people when doing the melted butter, buttermilk, vanilla and egg part. Unless you are an experienced baker you may not think to make sure to cool the melted butter a little bit otherwise you will scramble the egg and curdle the buttermilk further if it’s too hot. Wanted to add that to save someone having to throw out their batter. The taste was great.
Ella Gilbert says
Thank you for the tip, I'll add that in the recipe card!
Alicia says
Can you bake these as mini donuts? What would you change for the timing of baking if so?
Ella Gilbert says
Hi! I haven't tested these as mini donuts, I would try just one in the oven and keep an eye on it and go from there!
Aunt J says
I have grown to prefer baking using weight rather than volume, so I was especially happy to find this recipe that I did not have to convert. Everybody was very pleased with these donuts. Because this fam loves cinnamon chocolate sheet cake, I omitted nutmeg in favor of cinnamon. That was a huge hit - very popular. I like a great recipe that calls for common pantry staples and LOVE a recipe I can prepare without making a giant mess of the kitchen. This one checked off all the boxes.
Here's a prep hack for early morning donuts: Scale, whisk, sift ingredients the night before; dry in one bowl, wet in another. In the morning as the oven preheats, finish preparing the batter and filling the cavities. The aroma gets everybody up!