Monday, July 14, 2014

Lavender cream doughnuts



Warning - avert your eyes to avoid addiction.

Recently, The Guardian published a spread on Justin Gellatly, formerly of Fergus Henderson's St Johns in London, but now of Bread Ahead in Borough Market.   Justin had published a baking book called Bread, Cake, Doughnut, Pudding with a gorgeous photo of cream-filled doughnuts on the cover.  I immediately fell in love with this book and bought it.

You don't have to buy the book to get a hold of Justin's doughnut recipe - it is published here in The Guardian.  However, if you don't have the book, you won't find out all of the amazing different filling variations for these doughnuts.

Now don't get me wrong - making these doughnuts is a bit of a production.  However, they are soooooooo  good that it is worth it. 

I chose to flavour my custard with lavender liqueur from Castle Glen, inspired by Justin's violet cream version, and sprinkled the top of the donuts with crushed crystallised violets because they look so pretty: 


Take a look inside these fat, delicious doughnuts:


Instead of bread flour, I just used plain white flour to make my doughnuts, which seemed to work just fine.  I cut down some of the production in the recipe, by not chilling the dough overnight, and only rising my doughnuts for 2 hours instead of four, which seemed plenty for them to double in size.  I also didn't bother with checking the temperature of the cooking oil with a thermometer, which seems a bit of a faff and makes the recipe a little unapproachable.  Instead, I just heated the oil until the handle of a wooden spoon generated bubbles when dipped into the hot oil, and cooked away.

The donuts turned out just fine, despite my changes to the method - they were cooked on the outside and on the inside without burning, and plumped  up perfectly when I piped in the pastry cream.

The only problem that eventuated was that these doughnuts were irresistible. I made a half batch and got 9 donuts, ate 2 of them and promptly had to get the rest out of my house so I was not tempted to scoff the lot.  I gave the remaining donuts to my friends boxed in pretty little boxes that I picked up at Woollies:


These donuts smell devine, like the best bakery you have ever walked into, and as I mentioned, are well worth the time needed to make them.

9 comments:

Lorraine @ Not Quite Nigella said...

These look spectacular Cakelaw! I love violets and donuts and they look like they've got a generous amount of cream filling in them too :D

Johanna GGG said...

I think I am addicted already = wish I had your self control - I am sure I could scoff the whole lot - they look amazing

Kari said...

These are like no donuts I've seen before! They are in a completely different category in fact - what an amazing twist on the filling and a really impressive effort to make at home.

Mae Travels said...

You are brave! I fear the deep fryer. What lucky friends you have.

I also love the Guardian's cooking section.

Jill said...

They look fantastic! And the box you put them in is really cute.

Geri Saucier said...

These donuts look fantastic:) I love lavender. I must give these a try. Thanks for sharing.

Ivy Sew said...

Hi Cakealaw, your lavender cream doughnuts look awesome and tempting. Thumbs up and regards :)

Jora said...

I am so jealous of your friends! These look, and sound, absolutely incredible. I've never seen a lavender doughnut. You've made me hungry and I just finished lunch.

Kayte said...

I am always amazed how you manage to figure out how to make adjustments and have things turn out so great. Lots of experience in baking is my guess. Cute packaging.