Every Halloween season, I look forward to carrying on the family tradition of making donuts and wassail and sharing with my friends. I’ve always made my dad’s grandma’s recipe but this year, I saw a post from Bon Appetit about their Apple Cider Doughnut recipe and saw that it had APPLE BUTTER in the ingredients list and I was totally sold. You can keep the dough chilled in the fridge for a day, so it’s easy to make ahead, or do what I did and make two batches—cooking them one day apart.

Normally I like to alter a recipe that I find from another source if I post it to the blog—even just a little bit—but this was so perfect that I followed it exactly. So get to your local grocery store and get some cider and some apple butter and taste this glory!

Ingredients

Directions

1. Bring cinnamon sticks and apple cider to a boil in a large skillet over medium-high heat and cook until liquid is thick, syrupy, and reduced to about ⅓ cup, 20–30 minutes. Scrape into a medium bowl and whisk in apple butter, buttermilk, and vanilla until incorporated; set aside.

2. Whisk baking powder, salt, baking soda, nutmeg, 3½ cups flour, and 1 tsp. ground cinnamon in a medium bowl. Using an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter, brown sugar, and ¼ cup granulated sugar in a large bowl until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Add eggs one at a time, beating until well blended after each addition. Reduce mixer speed to low and add dry ingredients in 2 additions, alternating with cider mixture in 2 additions, starting with dry ingredients and ending with cider mixture (dough will be very soft and sticky).

3. Scrape dough onto a parchment lined-rimmed baking sheet thoroughly dusted with flour (about ⅓ cup). Dust hands and top of dough with more flour, then gently pat dough to ¾” thick. (Dough will be really sticky!) Dust with more flour and tightly cover with plastic wrap; chill dough at least 3 hours.

4. Whisk remaining 1 cup granulated sugar and 1 Tbsp. cinnamon in a small bowl until no lumps remain. (We ended up using more than this)

5. Working on baking sheet, punch out as many rounds as you can with 3¼” cutter, then use 1¼” cutter to punch out center of each round. Gather doughnut scraps, reserving holes, and gently re-roll without overworking dough; repeat until all dough has been used (you should have 18 doughnuts).

6. Set a wire rack inside a paper towel-lined rimmed baking sheet. Fit a large pot with deep-fry thermometer and pour in oil to a depth of 3″. Heat over medium-high until thermometer registers 350°. Working in batches (I did about 4 donuts at a time), fry doughnuts until deep golden brown, about 3 minutes per side. Transfer to prepared rack and let cool slightly. Fry doughnut holes until deep golden brown, about 2 minutes per side. Transfer to prepared rack and let cool slightly. Toss warm doughnuts and doughnut holes in cinnamon sugar.

   Do Ahead: Dough can be made 1 day ahead; cover and chill.

-CK 1.0