Pumpkin Maple Butter Swirled Donut Muffins

I love donuts but no longer eat them often. One of the first recipes I ever tried making on my own (back when I was in 7th grade) was a donut recipe and also have a great yeasted donut recipe that I have posted on the blog, but its been a while that I have made them at home, for the fear that I will end up eating a good portion of them.

For people who don’t want to take out their frying pans and indulge in donuts, I am sharing this recipe for Pumpkin Maple Butter Swirled Donut muffins today on the blog. Topped with melted butter and cinnamon sugar, they combine the taste of donuts, but in a baked muffin form. Its a win-win situation for donut lovers who are watching their weight, but still want the occasional carbs aka people like me!

I had developed this recipe in collaboration with Sprouts and their newly launched line of pumpkin products and you can also find the recipe along with other mouthwatering recipes on their website . Since it’s still pumpkin spice season I thought I will share it here on the blog, in case you missed it there.

Pumpkin Maple Butter Swirled Donut Muffins

If you have a Sprouts close to you, I highly recommend their maple pumpkin butter for these. Its just adds to the flavor of the donut muffins. The maple butter is also great on toast, or on these pumpkin maple butter cheesecake bars recipe that I shared a few weeks back. If you do not live close to a Sprouts,  despair not. You can still make these and skip using it. You can also get creative and use homemade preserve or nutella or any other flavored butter for the swirl. Share results if you do decide to substitute.

I adapted this recipe from here, but since I made quite a few changes it was only on the third attempt that I got it right. Thankfully, I had taste testers to get them off my hand each time I tried it and eventually developed a recipe I liked. Substituting half of the butter with applesauce and replacing half of the all purpose flour with whole wheat flour makes these donut muffins even better, since you can feel a tad less guilty eating them.

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Yeast raised donuts

Yeast Raised Donuts

So well, with a very heavy heart, I have to break this news that I turned 29 last week. A year short of the big three-O. The past couple of years celebrating my birthday just hasn’t been my thing. This year even more so and no its not the age thing. I am pretty comfortable with getting old. Getting grey hair, THAT I am not comfortable with.

Age is just a number and I have realized that as I am growing older I have become more fun to be with. Or so I would like to think. But honestly, I was a really reserved girl growing up. Would not talk, would be very shy, kept to myself most of the time. I am still most of all that, but yes I have loosened up a bit over the years.

I also feel its never too late to do anything, but yes with age certain things do take a lot more effort, and the things on my bucket list (I love pinterest to keep a track of these things) need to be crossed off as soon as possible. I did cross off cake decorating this year from my bucket list. 🙂 So I have made some progress on crossing things off my list, and I am not worried about that either.

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For those of (the very few) you, who have been following my blog, would probably remember me mentioning having these awesomelly sinful apple cider donuts at an apple orchard that we went during the pumpkin picking festival. Since then, I have been dreaming of trying my own version at home. Finally, on Friday I got the opportunity.

Every Friday is coffee morning. A bunch of us ladies (stuck in this god forsaken town with nothing much to do) get together at someone’s place for coffee and general chit chat. This Friday was coffee at my place and the perfect time to try making apple cider donuts.

Cider donuts are cake doughnuts, unlike the yeast doughnuts I have made in the past and have been generally good at making. I got the recipe off Smitten Kitchen’s site (my regular go to site). Deb uses shortening for frying. I found it a novel idea, plus it was the best way to use the Crisco that had been lying in my fridge for weeks (or was it months?). And the best part, frying in Crisco makes the donuts less greasy than frying in oil. Of course, most shortenings have trans fats which clog your arteries but luckily, I had, lying in my refrigerator, the zero trans fat Crisco. Lo and behold!

The donuts turned out awesome, very very close to the ones I had at the Orchard. They are definitely best freshly fried, but can be successfully reheated in the oven too. The donuts are very delicate, thanks to being cake like. So treat them with care. The dough is very sticky so be sure to freeze the dough before cutting the circles and flour generously!

Though sweet just the way they are, I prefer mine topped with a little cinnamon sugar. I glazed the donut holes with apple cider. Everyone at the coffee loved them- I got the tag of being a good cook that day. I am a happy baker!


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