Best Homemade Donut Recipe (family fun!)

Every fall in late October we make HOMEMADE DONUTS!  Now years later my grown kids still come back home for a warm homemade donut! 

Often times I have invited families or friends and even had groups of teen girls over for donut making! I’ve had so many fun donut making parties over the years, and I have many fond memories of them all! 

I mean seriously……Everyone loves to make (and eat) warm Homemade Donuts along with some hot Apple Cider- go here for my easy hot cider recipe!

I have been making this recipe since my oldest son was about 5 years old, that was ALOT of years ago:)  It all began when I was a young mom with a small flock of young kiddos, and I wanted something fun to do with them, it was halloween weekend, and so instead of taking them out trick or treating. I was not into halloween, plus it was always cold, wet rainy, and we lived waaay out in the country, so I thought hmmm I’ll make a batch of home made donut dough and see how it turns out! ……..And thus it started…. homemade donut making every October!!! 

Warm with glaze, dunked in chocolate, or even topped with sprinkles! I’d let them have fun making donuts in all those yummy ways as well as round ones, hearts, braids or tiger tails, as my boys would call them! So donut making became a family favorite tradition we did every fall in late October! It even became known if you stopped over to our house, on that weekend you’d likely get to enjoy a warm, off the rack donut, and even get sent home with a few on a plate.♥

So once we made these yummy warm donuts they wanted to repeat this family fun night every Fall (of course)……and we did. Often we’d also invite other families or neighbor kids over and make donuts throughout the fall, over several weekends!  

Now donuts aren’t really hard to make, they just take bit time like making bread, but the dough is very very similar. All you do is just mix-up a batch of dough, let them rise, fry them up and I use my trusty ole cast iron dutch oven pan for heating my oil and frying them in, and then you dunk, dip, and EAT 🙂

Mom’s Donut Recipe:
2 Tablespoons dry instant Yeast
1/4 cup water – warm
Dissolve in small dish and let set 3-5 min.  before whisking into the below.
In my large stainless kitchenaide mixing bowl I put:
1 cup milk – warm   (not hot or you’ll kill the yeast!)
1/2 cup white sugar
3/4 cup  palm shortening (its a healthy choice vs crisco shortening)
1 teaspoon Himalayan Sea salt
1 cup mashed potatoes- warm* (if you have leftover great if not, you can use instant)
Now on low, beat these ingredients together first. Then add and beat in the above yeast mixture into this bowl now.
Ok last you Add:
2 eggs  – beat in with beaters. Then last is the flour.
4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour  –  I blend the flour into dough a cup at a time, until a nice soft dough forms. Sometimes you don’t need all the flour, sometimes you need a lil more. You want a nice soft dough, a tad sticky/moist. 

Now you cover your bowl with clean kitchen towel and let it rise until dough is doubled (about 2 hours). Next take dough out of the bowl and knead it a little, then roll it out thick. Next cut out circles of dough using a large drinking glass or a wide mouth canning jar works great.  For the donut holes I use a small spice jar to cut out the donut center.

Next place cut out donuts and donut holes on lightly greased cookie sheets and let them rise for about  30-40 minutes.
Next you want to get the oil hot. I find my good ole black cast-iron dutch oven pot works great for this. Cast iron pots are great for deep frying, because 1st they hold the temperature really well and its very easy cleanup with them. No ruining any other pan for this.   I fill it 1/3 full or so, just enough so the donuts will float well in it.  Then when the oil is about 366 degrees. (Now that’s about the perfect temp, so they fry but don’t burn. Much below 366 and they soak oil instead of cook) so keep it close to 366 degrees and you’ll pull out perfect golden donuts. Next gently slide in a couple donuts at a time and cook them for a couple minutes on each side.  Lift them out of the oil when golden, and set on paper towels. Then we move to a cooling rack and while warm you can glaze them, roll in powder sugar or coat in cinnamon sugar or dunk tops in chocolate glaze.

This makes about 15 donuts and 15 donut holes in which was never enough for the clan of kids and friends at our place, so I always doubled it!

Helpful Tip for mashed potatoes – you can use leftover ones or you can use 1/2 cup of instant potato flakes with 1 cup of very hot water added to it, to equal the measured amount of potatoes needed). You want your mashed potatoes on the thin side, not too over thick, so add water to them if needed, and then measure out your 1 cup for the recipe. I typically always made roast beef and mashed potatoes the week I was going to make donuts…..just so I would have a cup of potatoes leftover. Years later, I used the quick warm cup of instant potato flakes made up as mentioned above. Either way works well, but having the potato in your dough makes theee very best donuts ever!!!

Note: HOT OIL is NOT FOR KIDDO’s to do. So be wise here and be careful. In all honesty I don’t think anyone was ever burned making donuts, as we have great respect for hot oil and keeping everyone safe but still having fun!

You can see below, you can top your donuts with chocolate glaze, sprinkles or anything else your heart desires.♥

Just another note – I included this picture above, as a reminder……This is NOT the time to be neat and fussy! This is the time for FUN MEMORIES and creative yumminess! Soooooo have fun mamma, and let it get a lil messy, sticky and yummy 🙂

Another Helpful Tip: set out Wax paper underneath your cooling racks and it makes for super easy clean up especially when your having more people or donut making parties!

Yeh, they really do still all come back often, for fall donut making night! ❤️

Over the years we have enjoyed them a lot of ways – but it seems the good ole warm glazed ones are still the well favored! I hope you give these a try and enjoy a fun fall evening with friends or family, making and eating warm donuts together!

It really is a fun family thing to do! 

p.s…… Add a lil fall to your kitchen windowsill! Perfect place to use sunflowers with stems that are toooo short for a vase, it makes a VERY cheerful spot for washing up alllll the memory filled dishes afterwards 🙂

Now if you want to see even more donut making Party Fun, go here.

You might also like…Hot Cider or Turkey Cookies!