Baked Glazed Donuts (grain-free/sugar-free/dairy-free option)
The short story: donuts, healthy, 1 bowl, 30 minutes max to your mouth.
Longer version: Donuts have to be one of the all-time yummiest splurges. They aren’t just at specialty donut shops, they’re staring at you from every grocery store bakery you pass. Their smell wafts out to welcome you. Heaven forbid you go to the grocery (with kids or without!) in the early morning! Children love them; I think because of the hole in the middle – it’s a perfect handle. I love them no matter what shape they are. Donuts are always a treat. You know, someone at the office went out for donuts because it’s Friday or the church breakfast has them with coffee or Mama is under the weather or gone somewhere and Daddy “does breakfast” for the kids, you get the idea.
Conventional donuts also happen to be one of the most nutrient-lacking, bad ingredient-packing little treats you can find. To add insult to injury let’s say you are diabetic, gluten intolerant, you are trying to lose weight or just be healthy in general but you. would. still. love. a. donut! There is not a good commercial alternative to be found. Sad.
But it doesn’t have to be so! You can make them quickly and easily at home! You don’t need a deep fryer or even a little gadget cooker made for making mini-donuts. All you need is a donut pan. If you don’t already own one (two! four!) donut pans – make this a priority in your budget! Think of the yummy treats just waiting on the other side of that less-than-ten-dollar purchase – priceless!
Okay, if you’re being a whiny kid and just want the donut recipe, scroll on down. But if you want to know why these particular ingredients are in my recipe and what they do (or don’t do) and how to tweak it up to fit your needs then keep reading and earn your treat…
This is a very healthy alternative to the conventional donut. Let’s talk about the grain-free part: this recipe uses low-glycemic, protein-rich blanched almond flour from Honeyville Grain - my all-time favorite almond flour because it yields a soft moist crumb every time. To bring it up a notch to that soft doughy, dreamy texture of a donut I’ve replaced half of the almond flour in my usual recipe with arrowroot flour (or tapioca flour would work the same as well).
The arrowroot and tapioca starch flours are made from the tuber vegetable roots and are naturally gluten and grain-free. These flours will add a few carbs to the total recipe but this recipe is still pretty low-carb over-all compared to the conventional type.
A plus to using some occasional tuber starches like this is that they act as prebiotics. We all try to get good probiotics into our diet by fermented foods and supplements but those live little critters have to eat! If you have NO carbs in your diet <ever> then the pro (good) biotic (life) bacteria have nothing to eat and they die – without having benefitted your body. A small amount of resistant starch acts as a prebiotic and feeds the probiotic so that they grow and are happy to multiply. This makes everybody happy; your gut bacteria, your hormones and you (when you eat these donuts).
Please note, if you are in a serious weight loss effort, are dealing with a candida issue, on a specific carbohydrate diet or need to be on a very low-carb or ketogenic diet right now – use all almond flour and no arrowroot, the donuts will still be mouth-wateringly delicious, just a little cakier. Another option is that you could replace a part of the arrowroot or almond flour with a protein powder (whey or a vegetarian version). It will keep the carbs lower but you will get a donut that’s a bit drier in texture, not quite as downey soft. No problem if you’re a dunker. Still a huge treat!
As far as the sweeteners go, I prefer to use a combination of natural, no-sugar sweeteners, that are not artificial sweeteners. The two we are using in this recipe are both zero on the glycemic scale. They are stevia (made from an herb plant) and erythritol (made from naturally fermented sugar alcohols).
The dairy free part of this recipe is optional and can be made either way!
My favorite fat to bake with is coconut oil. That often requires having to melt the oil and let it cool before adding it to a recipe. It’s worth doing but I’ve found a little trick that helps if you’re in a pinch. Have you heard of MCT oil? It stands for Medium Chain Triglycerides. MCT’s are comprised of primarily caprylic and capric fatty acids portions of coconut oil. It is naturally liquid at room temperature so when I’m short on time for melting and cooling whole coconut oil, I use it as a substitute.
So, we’re going to recap here: donut = treat. Donuts, of course, are not intended to be an everyday breakfast choice but as far as donuts go these are pretty healthy fare! These are seriously lower glycemic and lower carb than their white flour and white sugar counterparts. They have good fats instead of bad hydrogenated artificial fat sources. Deliciousness factor = very high. We do not sacrifice taste and texture for healthy here. This is a true treat!
As far as difficulty, this recipe is also a treat; one bowl, only about 30 minutes from start to finish. You could even mix the wet ingredients and store in the fridge overnight and mix the dry ingredients and leave sealed on the counter, the next morning blend together and bake. That would bring it down to a total of about 20 minutes. Just enough time to scramble some free-range eggs, set the table and pour the raw milk.
Did you think I would skip the glaze? Not a chance – this is a treat, not a compromise. For a quick and easy but mostly delicious (completely sugar-free) glaze see below! You may notice that the pic above does not show any glaze – that’s because we got all up in a donut frenzy and forgot to take another shot before we ate them 
- 3 eggs
- 1/4 cup milk raw milk or almond milk, etc.)
- 2 tbsp MCT oil or coconut oil, melted and cooled
- 1/4 tsp Bragg’s Raw Apple Cider Vinegar
- 1/2 tsp Liquid Vanilla Stevia Extract about 4 squirter’s full
- 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1 1/4 cup Honeyville Grain Blanched Almond Flour
- 1 1/4 cup arrowroot powder or tapioca flour or protein powder
- 1/4 cup erythritol
- 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/8 tsp Real sea salt
- 1 cup erythritol powdered in a spice/coffee grinder or magic bullet, etc.
- 2-4 tbsp almond milk just enough to thin to glaze consistency
- 1 tbsp MCT oil or coconut oil melted and cooled
- 1 tbsp pure vanilla extract
- 1 tbsp Liquid Vanilla Stevia Extract
- 1/8 tsp Real sea salt
- Pre-heat oven to 375 F. Grease donut pans with coconut oil spray.
- Blend liquids together in bowl, add dry ingredients and incorporate.
- Divide batter into 2 donut pans and bake for 15 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean and dry.
- Let cool 5 minutes then turn onto a cooling rack. They look best “upside-down” of the way they baked in the pan.
- Powder the erythritol. You can buy already powdered but it is much more costly and only takes a minute to powder it yourself.
- Mix everything in a mixer until smooth and liquidy. This is a glaze not a frosting or icing. This one is intended to make a thin sweet layer on the donut, not set on top all thick-like where you can run your finger through it. These are like the glazed donuts at the bakery, not the frosted cake donuts.
- Put glaze in a shallow bowl and turn each donut’s top for a swirl through the glaze then return to the cooling rack with the most donuty side up.
My favorite almond flour is from Honeyville Grain – where I get the best grain-free items! Click on their affiliate link on the left of the page to order almond flour plus many of the ingredients I bake with.
So, let me know – are you a dunker or not? If so, what do you like to dunk your donuts in? When you make these please come back here and let me know! Also, don’t forget to share the yummy with all your friends you socialite, you!
This post was shared on The Homestead Barn Hop, Clever Chicks Blog Hop, Thank Goodness It’s Monday, Mostly Homemade Mondays, Much Ado About Monday, The Art of Homemaking Mondays, Modest Monday, Monday’s Musings, Natural Living Monday, Making Your Home Sing Monday, Fat Tuesday, Titus2sDay, Titus 2 Tuesday, Homemaking Link-Up, Real Food Wednesdays, Allergy-Free Wednesday, Wildcrafting Wednesday, The Homeacre Hop , Think Tank Thursday, Real Food Fridays, Old-Fashioned Friday, Fabulous Finds, From the Farm, Foodie Fridays & Simple Saturdays !
24 Comments on “Baked Glazed Donuts (grain-free/sugar-free/dairy-free option)”
Since I prefer using natural sugars to sugar substitutes (even natural ones), how much sugar or honey would be used in this recipe if using that instead of erythritrol?
Hi Jill!
That’s a great question! Erythritol is approximately 70% as sweet tasting (but 0 glycemic or carbs) as white sugar (that’s why we add the stevia to “bump up” the sweetness by 30% to equal the taste of white sugar). So, if you are using white sugar you would add 30% more than the amount of erythritol called for in the recipe and eliminate the stevia. If you are using Sucanat, Rapidura, Turbinado or other type brands of “natural sugars” I would try the amount listed for the erythritol first and taste test the batter to see if you think you need more before adding. Because the molasses has been added back into the sugar in those types it is usually a bit sweeter than plain white sugar (and has a richer flavor).
If I were going to opt for a higher carb version and I wanted to use another natural sweetener other than erythritol I would use coconut palm sugar because it has approximately 1/2 of the GI of sugar and has a delicious brown sugar taste.
The donut part of this recipe tastes more like a deep-fried glazed donut from a bakery – not super sweet inside because it has that sweet glaze on the outside.
Check back in and let me know how you like the donuts!
Oh my gosh; I love you!! I’ve been GF for three years (grain-free for about 3 mos.) and in ALL that time, I have never really struggled with “craving” a particular gluten-filled thing. Until this week. My husband has some chocolate-coated donuts in the house and it has taken everything. in. me. not to eat them. (It’s not even about the flavor; something about that contrast of textures is appealing to me.)
So now I just have to whip these up and find a coating recipe and I’m golden.
Thank you!!!
Rachel – I hear ya girl! Sometimes you just *need* a donut! I have a chocolate donut recipe I’ll post one day too.
For these, if you want a healthy chocolate icing, you can try mixing some coconut “butter”, cocoa powder and some liquid vanilla stevia extract (or plain and some vanilla extract) and thin with a little almond milk (etc.) until you get the consistency you want. There are zillions of ways to make some choco icing but that easy one just came to mind.
Please let me know when you make them!
p.s. I’m gonna head over and check out your site right now!
I love how you break everything down so thoroughly. The donuts look wonderful and I know my gf friends would love them. I would be honored if you would stop by and share your recipe today at Foodie Fridays. It’s not all real food at the party but I would love to infuse a big healthy dose of it into the party. Thanks so much and I hope to see you there.
Blessings,
Shari
http://puregracefarms.com/2014/09/foodie-fridays-were-growing/
Shari – Thank you so much! That truly was a blessing! I would love to join you – I’ll head over to your site now : )
Great recipe. I have a ? – Would it work to substitute coconut or buckwheat flour for the almond flour? I would like to try these and I have many food allergies and can’t tolerate any nut flours or gluten. Thanks for sharing on Real Food Fridays. So glad to have you as part or our group. Will pin & twitt. Have a healthy happy day.
Marla – Thank you! Buckwheat would probably work – if you try it please come back and let us know. Coconut flour would not work with this recipe as is, because it’s such a thirsty flour. BUT I do have a coconut flour version scribbled somewhere, I’ll try to find it and share it!
I am thrilled you stopped in to share at #foodiefridays this week. What great recipes and a wonderful sweet spirit you have. Glad to connect and I hope you come back again and share next week. It would be a real privilege.
Blessings,
Shari
Yay! I can have donuts again! Can’t wait to try this recipe!
KarenLynn – I hope you like them! Please let me know if you try them!
I love this recipe, BUT it’s not just a list of ingredients like most recipes, it’s a lesson in the how’s and why’s and for someone like me who is new to a wheat free life choice I found it extremely valuable.
Do to the costs of products, I will need to replace wheat with others as I run out and Angie helps me to see what I should buy/use and why! FABULOUS information!
Laura – Thank you so much! There’s definitely a learning curve but it’s easy once you try it! You will feel so much better and never miss a goodie!
wow, I am impressed with the 30 minutes max. These look great.
Thanks for sharing at Wildcrafting Wednesday.
Jennifer – It was my pleasure! Thanks for stopping by!
Great recipe sharing the why’s and how’s!
Thank you for sharing last week on the Art of Home-Making Mondays! Our new link up is up and running if you would like to join in again this week
Happy Monday to you!
Thank you for having me! I would love to join you again!
Thank you for this recipe I feel like I can eat doughnuts again. This post will be featured on tomorrow’s link up, thanks for sharing on Real Food Fridays.
Joyce – Wow! Thank you so much! I know the feeling of not being able to eat things – so I am as happy for you to get to eat donuts as I am blessed that you chose my post for a feature!
Hi Angelia,
Just a note to let you know that I used your post as one of my features for this weeks Real Food Fridays Blog Hop that is live tonight @ 7pm EST. Thanks so much for sharing and being part of Real Food Fridays. Marla
Marla – Bless your heart! Thank you so much for that! I have to travel tonight (our boys are playing out of town today) but I’ll join y’all tomorrow for sure!
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We love these!! Mike says it is the best recipe we’ve made since I hauled the boys kicking and screaming into the gluten-free, sugar-free world. We don’t have any erythritol (though I will be ordering some to try – Thanks Angie), so we used powdered Stevia and in place of the liquid Stevia, 1 T. of raw honey. Mike loves coconut; so we substituted 1/4 c. of the almond flour for coconut flour and 1/4 c. of the arrowroot for unsweetened coconut shreds. We love them without the glaze, as we are all coffee dunkers!! Delicious!!
Mary – Thank you! I’m SO glad y’all liked them! Thanks for sharing your subs with us – that helps others to see how easy it is to tweak to meet their personal needs, preferences and pantries!