High Altitude Baked Maple Glazed Donuts
A quick and easy high altitude recipe for baked maple donuts, coated in sugar or topped with sweet brown butter maple glaze.
All recipes on Curly Girl Kitchen are developed for high altitude at 5,280 feet. See FAQs for adjusting to higher or lower elevations.
Equipment
- Fluted Doughnut Pans
Ingredients
Donuts
- 3 tbsp pure maple syrup
- ½ cup light brown sugar, lightly packed
- 1 large egg
- ½ cup full fat sour cream
- ¼ cup whole milk
- ½ cup unsalted butter, melted
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tsp maple extract
- 1 ¾ cups all-purpose flour, fluffed, spooned and leveled
- 1 ½ tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- ⅛ tsp ground cardamom
Glaze
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 1 tbsp meringue powder
- ⅛ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- 4 tbsp unsalted butter
- ¼ cup pure maple syrup
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
Donuts
- Preheat the oven to 375 F, and position a rack in the center of the oven. Thoroughly spray your donut pans with non stick baking spray.
- In a bowl, whisk together the maple syrup, brown sugar, egg, sour cream, milk, melted butter, vanilla and maple extracts, until well combined.
- Separately, sift together the flour, baking powder, salt and cardamom.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet, and whisk just until combined.
- To easily fill the doughnut pans, spoon the batter into a piping bag, snip off the end, and pipe the batter into the pans, filling them no more than half full.Note: the batter thickens a little as it sits, and can be difficult to use a spoon to spread it into the pans. Piping it in is much quicker and easier.
- Bake the doughnuts until risen and the tops spring back when gently touched. This will take about 8 minutes using the doughnut pan featured, which is a little smaller than a standard size. With a mini doughnut pan, the donuts may need just 6-8 minutes to bake. With a standard sized doughnut pan, they'll need about 10-12 minutes to bake.
- Cool the donuts in the pan for 2 minutes, then gently turn the pan over onto a cooling rack, letting the donuts fall out onto the rack. Spray the pan again with non stick baking spray, refill with the remaining batter, and bake the rest of the donuts. Cool the donuts completely before dipping in the glaze.
- Note: if you don't want to make the glaze, simply dip the cooled donuts in granulated sugar until covered in sugar.
Glaze
- In a bowl, whisk together the powdered sugar, meringue powder and salt. Set aside.
- In a small saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat. Continue to cook the butter for several minutes, until a layer of foam forms on top and nutty golden brown milk solids form at the bottom of the pan. Immediately remove the pan from the heat and use a spatula to scrape up the golden bits.
- Pour the hot browned butter into the powdered sugar mixture, and add the maple syrup and vanilla extract. Whisk until thick and smooth. Note: If the icing seems too thick, you can add a little milk, 1 tablespoon at a time, if you prefer a thinner glaze. I did not add any milk to mine, though.
- Take the cooled donuts and dip them into the icing, or just use a spoon to spread it on top. Since the icing is thick, I spread it out just a little with a small icing spatula after dipping the donuts. Set the donuts back on the cooling rack and let them sit until the icing is set, which will just take a few minutes.
- Doughnuts are best served the same day they're baked, but they can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.
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