Balance cold days with warm spices and familiar comfort in pumpkin doughnuts.
The nostalgia of fresh doughnuts inspires family togetherness, homey holidays, and cozy contentment. Add in warm notes of pumpkin spice, and you have a recipe that truly brings sweet memories to the table this season.
Quality You Can Taste
Jay Kenny, owner of DoughBoys Donuts, knows how a labor of love is required to create the perfect sweet treat. First opened in 2009, his three bakeries selling countless doughnuts and pastries can be found in Reno and Sparks.
To create any pumpkin-spiced doughnut, the purée and spices should be as pure as possible.
“When it comes to the pumpkin doughnut, we try to find the best pumpkin we can find,” Kenny says. “We actually put pumpkin in the doughnut. And then we use quite a bit of pumpkin spice and cinnamon — even in the crumb [topping] that we make here in house. We blend it all together, and it comes out to be perfection.”
Timing is Everything
Capturing a balance of fried and fluffy is baked into the details. Ensuring your batter is smooth — no bumps or lumps — creates that perfectly uniform sponge consistency. To guarantee a golden crust, fry your doughnuts in quality cooking oil at 365 degrees F for roughly 40 seconds on each side.
“If you want to glaze your doughnuts, do that right after they come out of the oil,” Kenny says. “If you want to cover them in confectioners sugar, make sure they cool to room temperature first so the sugar doesn’t dissolve.”
To cover your doughnuts with a crumb topping after a generous glaze, consider making a first batch of doughnuts the day before and crumbling them up with pumpkin spice to create the ultimate sweet coating.
Passion in Pastries
More than any ingredient or trick, a recipe’s legacy calls for the emotional expression a baker sprinkles into each bite.
“I think the biggest difference when it comes to doughnuts is whether they’re made by machine or really made by hand,” he says. “I always say [they’re] made with love. We’re cutting them by hand. We’re cranking them by hand. You know everything is hands-on … [W]e’re still doing it the old way.”
Whether you roll up your sleeves in the kitchen or take a worthwhile trip to your nearest DoughBoys location, the reward always is sweet.
“Doughnuts,” Kenny promises, “just make people happy.”
DoughBoys Donuts
Two locations in Reno and one in Sparks
Doughboysreno.com
Pumpkin Spiced Doughnuts
(courtesy of Jay Kenny, owner, DoughBoys Donuts in Reno and Sparks. Makes 2 dozen doughnuts)
4 pounds cake doughnut mix
1, 29-ounce can Libby’s 100 percent pure pumpkin purée
½ cup pumpkin spice
2½ cups lukewarm water
3½ tablespoons cinnamon
Cooking oil, such as soybean or vegetable, enough to safely fill a mini fryer or pot
In a blender, combine cake doughnut mix, water, pumpkin purée, pumpkin spice, and cinnamon. Mix on low for 30 seconds and then on medium-high for 30 seconds until batter is smooth. Let the batter rest for 3 minutes to thicken slightly.
Meanwhile, warm cooking oil in a mini fryer or deep pot to 365 degrees F on the stove. Scoop out batter and plop into heated oil for 40 seconds on each side or until golden.
For crumb doughnuts
Immediately after removing doughnuts from hot oil, drizzle them with glaze (mix 1 cup powdered sugar, 2 tablespoons milk, and ½ teaspoon vanilla extract). Once glazed, roll doughnuts in crumb mixture made of day-old doughnuts and pumpkin spice.
For sugar doughnuts
Once they’re out of the oil, cool doughnuts to room temperature (about 10 to 15 minutes). Once cooled, roll in confectioners sugar until coated.
