It might surprise you to know you can make healthier doughnuts and these Actifry chocolate glazed doughnuts are proof.

I had a resounding success a few weeks back when I experimented making doughnuts with a fruit of the forest jam in our Actifry and I’d been promising my kids a glazed version with sprinkles, so here they are!

These tasted amazing! So much so that I ate two, even though I am still supposed to be on a no refined sugar eating regime (shhh….don’t tell anyone). And it goes without saying that my kids absolutely loved them – the simple chocolate glaze and bright sprinkles make these the perfect treat for a children’s birthday party!

The measurements made nine medium-sized doughnuts but you could easily double the recipe to make more. The recipe below is for making the doughnuts using an Actifry, but I am sure it would be possible to bake these in the oven if you had a doughnut tin!

Print

Actifry Chocolate Glazed Doughnuts

Ingredients

Doughnuts:

• 50ml water
• 75ml milk
• 30g butter
• 25g fresh yeast
• 1 small egg
• 225-300g bread flour
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
• 30g sugar

Glaze:

• 100g powdered sugar
• 2 tablespoons cocoa powder
• 2-3 tablespoons milk

Instructions

1. Mix the water, milk and butter in a pan and warm just until the butter starts to melt, then remove from the heat. Let it sit for a while until all the butter has melted and the liquid is lukewarm. Add the yeast and finally beat in the egg. Let the mixture stand for around 5-10 minutes until the yeast begins to activate and froth.
2. In a bowl, mix 225g of flour along with the nutmeg, vanilla sugar and sugar. Pour in the wet ingredients and stir until a dough begins to form (add more flour as you need it). Knead the dough until it is nice and smooth (around 8-10 minutes) and then put back in the bowl, cover, and leave to rise in a warm place for about an hour.
3. Knock back the dough and then cut into 8 pieces (or less if you’d like them a little bigger). Smooth them into balls and pat down to flatten. Next, cut holes in the doughnuts (or you could leave them whole if you preferred). I used the end of a piping nozzle (I know! Clever!) because it was the right size for my doughnuts. However, I originally cut the holes before putting them to proof for the second time, and the holes shrunk, so I needed to cut them out again (there must be any easier way of doing this, so if anyone has a solution or simplification, please let me know!). Cover and leave to rise for a further 45 minutes.
4. To cook using the Actifry: remove the rotary part of it and pour in one tablespoons of oil. Put the lid on and let it run for a couple of minutes, so that it is warm when you put the dough in. Place the dough balls with a little space in between them (you may need cook them in several rounds – mine can only fit 6 in), replace the lid and start to cook. You will need to move them around yourself to make sure they are evenly browned (this is usually the job of the rotary attachment). When you remove them from the Actifry, you may find that some of the holes have closed over; if this is the case, just push the piping nozzle (or whatever else you used to make the holes) through the middles, and keep it there as the doughnut cools.
5. For the glaze: sift the icing sugar and cocoa together and then gradually add the milk until you have a thick glaze (too much milk and the glaze will just slide off; too little and it will be too thick to evenly cover the top of the doughnuts). Carefully dip the top of the doughnuts into the glaze and sprinkle with whatever decoration you choose. Allow the glaze to set (around 20 minutes) and enjoy!