Air Fryer Donuts

Preparation Time: 1 hour | Cooking Time: 20 minutes
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Make delicious Donuts with your Air Fryer.

The air fryer cooks delicious yeast cucumbers with very little extra fat, and each batch only takes four minutes! The Air Fryer circulates superheated air around the item, making it more efficient than an oven. And since it uses a lot less oil, it will have less fat than the ones made in a deep fryer. These yeast donuts are a great example of what an Air Fryer has to offer.

The ears are golden brown on the outside and soft and floppy on the inside. The recipe includes vanilla frosting but feels free to use a different flavor in the frosting. Chocolate frosting is a great option or top with melted butter and top with sugar and cinnamon.

Ingredients

Before moving towards the recipe, let’s have a glance at ingredients

● Granulated Sugar:

Granulated sugar is used in baking goods. It kept them soft and moist. Granulated sugar has fine crystals of size approx. 0.5mm. It is perfect for sprinkling on baking items.

● Active dry yeast ( or instant)

Yeast helps raise the dough. Yeast by reacting with sugar and oxygen in dough produces multiple yeast cells and Carbon dioxide. This carbon dioxide helps the dough to rise. This also gives airy light and spongy texture.

Active dry yeast and instant yeast are different from each other. Active dry yeast needs to be dissolved in water before adding to dry ingredients but the instant yeast can be used as it is.

● All-purpose flour

All-purpose flour is versatile and generally used wheat flour. It acts as a thickening agent. It helps in building structure. It has proteins that when hydrate interact with each other forming gluten.

● Egg

Eggs contain several Vitamins like V-A, V-B12, and minerals like selenium. Egg’s white and the yolk is a rich source of protein. It adds moisture and acts as a binding agent, glue, or glaze. It helps in combining all the ingredients.

● Butter

Being a solid fat butter is better than any other fat for use in baking. It adds moisture as well as helps in leavening.  

● Warm milk

The dairy products that we use in different recipes include eggs as well as milk.

Warm milk provides tenderness to the dough. It also adds richness to it.

● Vanilla extract

Vanilla extract enhances all the flavors in the recipe. It adds the flavor of vanilla, in the recipes that contain eggs, not significantly the same but it removes the unpleasant smell of egg.

Vanilla extract and vanilla essence are not the same in a way that vanilla extract is a natural product made of vanilla pods soaking in ethyl alcohol while vanilla essence is a synthetic vanilla flavor.

– Can we use vanilla essence instead of vanilla extract?

Yes, you can use vanilla essence instead of vanilla extract. If you want to use vanilla essence instead of vanilla extract then you get to know a fact that vanilla extract is stronger than vanilla essence in flavor. To add essence, you need to edit the amount. As per rough calculations:

1 tsp of vanilla extract = 1.5 tsp of vanilla essence

● Confectioner’s sugar

Confectioner’s sugar is powdered sugar. It contains 2-5% of an anti-caking agent like corn starch, potato starch, or tricalcium phosphate. It is a quick-dissolving sugar.

Proxy of confectioner’s sugar can be made at home by processing ordinary granulated sugar in a grinder.

Confectioner’s sugar is used in the glaze of this recipe.

● Maple flavor

The maple flavor is an ingredient used in different recipes that act as a sweetener and flavoring agent. Maple syrup is made of xylem sap of sugar maple, red maple, and black maple tree. Like vanilla extract, it also enhances the flavors of other ingredients. It is optional to use maple flavor.

● Sprinkles

Sprinkles are very small pieces of confectionery which are often used in decorating brownies, cupcakes, doughnuts, or ice creams. Sprinkles are colored candies used as a topping in different baking recipes.

In this recipe, sprinkles are used for topping.

– How to make sprinkles at home?

In a bowl add 8 ounces of confectioner’s sugar, 1 egg white at room temperature, ¾ teaspoon of vanilla extract, and ¼ teaspoon of salt. Mix them well in an electric mixer until a glue-like consistency formed. Mix it until confectionary’s sugar is fully dissolved.

Divide the mixture into many portions so that you can make sprinkles of different colors. Mix the food colors well in the mixture. Add the colored paste in the pastry bag fitted with a small pastry tip. Pipe out long and thin lines on parchment paper or pan. Repeat the process with every color. Allow the piped lines to sit uncovered for 24 hrs. Once the piped lines dried break them with a butter knife or bench scraper into smaller pieces of sprinkles.

Mix the different colored sprinkles and store them in an airtight jar for almost a month.

Recipe, Ingredients, Tips and Nutritional information

Ingredients

  • For the Doughnuts:
  • 2/3 cup warm milk (100 F to 110 F)
  • 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast (or instant)
  • 2 cups/9 ounces all-purpose flour (divided)
  • 1 large egg
  • 3 tablespoons butter (melted, plus more to brush on the doughnuts)
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • For the Glaze:
  • 2 cups/8 ounces confectioners' sugar
  • 3 tablespoons melted butter
  • 2 to 3 tablespoons hot water (plus more, as needed)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • Optional: 1/4 teaspoon maple flavor (or to taste)
  • Optional: sprinkles

Instructions

  1. Gather the ingredients.
  2. To make the doughnuts, combine the milk, sugar, and yeast in a mixing bowl and let stand for 5 to 10 minutes.
  3. Add about half of the flour, egg, 3 tablespoons of melted butter, salt, and 1 teaspoon of vanilla; whisk until well blended.
  4. Add the remaining flour and mix with a wooden spoon to make a soft dough. Let the dough rest for 5 minutes.
  5. Remove the dough to a floured surface and knead for about 7 to 8 minutes, adding more flour as needed to keep it from sticking.
  6. Transfer the dough to a greased bowl; turn it to grease the entire surface of the dough.
  7. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let it rise for 1 to 1 1/2 hours, or until doubled in bulk.
  8. Punch the dough down and roll it out to a thickness of about 1/4-inch to 3/8-inch.
  9. Use a round, 2 1/2-inch to 3 1/2-inch cutter to cut out rounds. Use a small, round cutter, such as the base of a large piping tube, to make the hole. Alternatively, use a doughnut cutter. Gather the scraps and re-roll them to cut out more doughnuts and holes.
  10. Place the cut-out doughnuts on lightly floured parchment paper and cover them with a greased sheet of plastic wrap or kitchen towel. Let them rise for about 30 minutes, or until doubled.
  11. Spray the air fryer basket with cooking oil spray. Set the temperature to 350 F and preheat for about 3 minutes. Place 2 to 4 doughnuts and holes in the preheated air fryer basket; brush with melted butter or spray with cooking oil spray. Cook the doughnuts for 4 minutes. Turn them out and repeat with the remaining doughnuts.
  12. Meanwhile, make the glaze. Sift the confectioners' sugar into a medium bowl. Add the 3 tablespoons of melted butter, 2 tablespoons hot water, and 1 teaspoon of vanilla. Mix until blended, adding more water as needed to make a thin glaze. Add maple flavoring if desired.
  13. Dip the tops of the doughnuts in the glaze. Set the doughnuts on a rack and let stand until the glaze sets. If the glaze becomes too thick, warm it in the microwave oven for about 10 to 20 seconds or add a bit more hot water.
  14. If desired, double dip the doughnuts for a thicker glaze or add sprinkles while the glaze is still wet.

● Tips

  • For golden-brown doughnuts, brush them evenly with melted butter just before they go into the air fryer.
  • The glaze can be mixed ahead of time. Just warm it in the microwave when you’re ready to dip the doughnuts.
  • Some of the prep may be done a day in advance. Prepare the dough, knead it, and put it in the greased bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate it overnight. Even refrigerated, the retarded dough will slowly rise. The next day, take the dough out of the refrigerator about 1 to 1 1/2 hours before you plan to roll it out and shape the doughnuts. It should be doubled in bulk—if not, give it a little more time at room temperature.

● Recipe Variation

  • To make cinnamon-sugar doughnuts, combine 1/2 cup of granulated sugar with 1 tablespoon of cinnamon. Coat the doughnuts and holes with melted butter and then roll them in the cinnamon-sugar mixture.

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