You're a Grand Old Donut

Hi there, happy Fourth! I hope everyone had a very nice time celebrating America's birthday. I, for one, had a lovely day filled with family, beach, 1776 (the movie, not the book), and of course yummy food. What kind of yummy food, Sarah? Glad you asked. Ever since I saw the buttermilk farmstead donuts in Baked Explorations, I've wanted to make them. Only problem is, donuts really need to be eaten the day they're made. Usually I can bring any class of baked goods to my office and they'll be gone within two hours. But I didn't feel like waking up super-early to make donuts to bring to the office. Sue me. So I needed a special occasion, one on which I knew I'd have a free morning and a captive audience forced to eat my donuts. And what better occasion than America's 236th birthday. What a dame.


The donuts were pretty easy to put together. The dough didn't cohere as well as I wanted it to but it didn't seem to negatively affect the end product. (Some of the donuts did come apart, but I think that was because they were too big.) My main piece of advice is to actually follow the recipe and fry the donuts for the full amount of time recommended. I took mine out when I thought they had achieved a nice brown color but then they were a little undercooked. Of course if you're in to things being undercooked (I am), it was all good. Throw together some vanilla glaze and slap some red and blue sprinkles on that sucker, and you've got yourself a delicious, patriotic treat. Happy birthday, dear America!


You can find the recipe here. (And for those readers concerned about my continuing saga with boiling oil - all of you, I'm sure - I will inform you that apart from one splatteriffic close call where the oil nearly came into contact with my shoeless foot, all was well. I think I'm getting more confident here.)