The Cupcake Café Cookbook is a gem for everyone who loves doughnuts, originally decorated cakes, or off-beat New York City eateries. The actual café is a funky daytime oasis in the still-iffy neighborhood once known as Hell's Kitchen. Ann Warren and her husband, Michael, started the café as a bakery in 1988. They now serve food, too, but their fame comes from the breakfast baked goods and Warren's strikingly creative butter cream-frosted cakes and cupcakes
Probably the best thing about making your own jelly doughnuts is being able to fill them with whatever jam or preserves you choose and with as much as you want. Of course there are some physical restraints here, particularly if you fill the doughnuts before you fry them, which is the more common method when making them at home. It's faster to fill them after they've been fried, but if the jelly is already in when the frying happens, its sweet fruit flavor will suffuse the delicate flesh of the doughnut. Since jelly doughnuts are made with a yeast dough, you need to allow enough time for them to rise twice before frying. If you are planning a morning fry, make the dough the night before and refrigerate it.
Makes: about 2 dozen doughnuts
2 ounces fresh cake yeast
1/2 cup tepid water (95 to 100 degrees F)
1 teaspoon granulated sugar
1/4 cup dark brown sugar
3 eggs plus 1 extra yolk
1/2 cup cooked and riced potatoes(about 2 medium potatoes)
6 ounces butter, melted (3/4 cup)
1 cup scalded milk
1 teaspoon fresh grated lemon rind
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
4 cups all-purpose flour, plus additional as needed
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
2 tablespoons dry powdered milk
1 egg white mixed with 1/2 cup milk
8-12 ounces jelly
solid vegetable shortening(use approximately 3/4 pound shortening per quart of fryer capacity-for a 4-quart vessel, use about 3 pounds shortening)
powdered sugar, for dusting (optional)
Mix the yeast with the warm water and granulated sugar and set aside for 5 minutes. Watch to see that the yeast foams before adding it to the other ingredients.
Mix the brown sugar, whole eggs, and extra yolk together. Add the riced potatoes, melted butter, and scalded milk and stir. Add the lemon rind and vanilla.
Sift the flour. Stir the salt, baking powder, and dry milk into the flour. Add the proofed yeast to the wet ingredients and mix well. Add all the flour, adding more flour if is too sticky or wet. Knead like a bread dough for about 5 minutes. Allow the dough to rise until doubled in bulk, then knead again.
Roll it out to about 1/4 inch thick and cut the dough into circles. Use a biscuit cutter, a cookie cutter, or the rim of a glass about 2 1/2 to 3 inches in diameter. Brush the edges of the circles with the egg and milk mixture. This is your egg wash.
If you are filling the doughnuts now, take about a tablespoon of jam, jelly, or preserves and spoon it onto the center of half of the circles. Cover each of these circles with one of the circles without jam (sandwich-style), egg wash side down. Press firmly around the edges to seal in the jam or jelly. Try not to get any jam over the seal or on the outside of the doughnut, where it would burn.
Allow the doughnuts to rise again, about 45 minutes. The length of time it will take for a yeast dough to rise depends in part on the surrounding temperature. Times are given for 11 room temperature" assuming a normal room temperature. (So if it's midsummer and you don't have an air conditioner, take that into account.) Dough will rise faster in a warmer spot, but a short rising time is not always desirable for flavor, or even necessarily convenient. Even in a relatively cold spot, such as a refrigerator, yeast dough will rise, albeit quite slowly. This "retarding" of the dough can allow you to prepare doughnut dough the night before and fry them in the morning. A longer rise will impart a nice yeast flavor. In a refrigerator a doubling in bulk should take about five to eight hours -longer for the first rising, shorter for a second. Wherever your dough is rising, do not try to speed things along by allowing your dough to get too warm. Too much heat can kill the yeast and even prematurely cook part of your dough. If you wish to fill the doughnuts after they are fried, form the doughnuts without jam inside but sealed the same way -seal two circles together and allow to rise again.
Near the end of the rising time, gradually heat your frying shortening to 365 degrees F. Shortening that is too hot will brown the doughnuts too quickly. Shortening that is not hot enough can result in greasy doughnuts. Fry the doughnuts by lowering them carefully into the shortening with a slotted spoon. Leave room for your doughnuts to expand a little. And don't put in too many doughnuts at once, as this may drastically lower the temperature of the shortening. Unless you are using an electric fryer with a thermostat, keep close watch on the temperature and adjust it accordingly. Fry the doughnuts about 30 seconds, then turn over one doughnut. If brown, turn over the others with a
slotted spoon. Depending on your fryer, each side will take 1/2 minute to 1 1/2 minutes. Allow them another 30 seconds to 1 1/2 minutes on the other side and remove. Drain these on paper towels and continue to fry the rest of your doughnut circles.
When cool enough to handle, unfilled doughnuts can be filled. Put whatever jam, jelly, or preserve you have chosen into a pastry bag with a #230 nozzle attached, or a #7 tip. Push the jam-filled tip into a doughnut (you'll find the
nozzle is a better tool here) and give the bag a good squeeze.
Cooled doughnuts can be dusted with powdered sugar, if you wish
