Freezing Uncooked Donuts for Fresh Later

Growing up, our family made donuts from time to time. When I was in high school, I made donuts on the weekends to sell. I'll have to post our family recipe and instructions another time so check back later. For now, I'm going to show you how I discovered that I could have fresh donuts every day without having to make the dough every time.

After I have made the dough, let it rise, rolled it out and cut out the shapes, I then place them on wax paper on a cookie sheet and put them into the freezer. When they are frozen, I can put them together into a container. Here, I'm showing you how they fit 3x3 in layers in my container. I just put some wax paper between each layer. You could probably even just put them all together in a bag. They won't stick together since they were already frozen separately.

On the day you want donuts, take out however many you want and set them on a plate to thaw and rise. I find 3 hours is about what they need.

When they are finished rising, deep fry them in hot oil on each side until they are golden.

Then you can glaze or frost them however you like.

My favourite is to coat them with cinnamon sugar. Mix together 3 tablespoons of sugar and 1 teaspoon of cinnamon. Put it in a sealable container, add the warm cooked donut, seal it and shake it around to coat.

And then you have freshly cooked, homemade donuts!

Note: I have tried thawing and letting them rise in the refrigerator overnight, but the outsides of the donuts dried out and became crusty so they didn't rise as much. They still tasted good, they just didn't rise as well. Maybe it would work if they were sealed in the refrigerator so they didn't dry out.

Also, I would also be wary to make sure the frozen donuts are well sealed in the freezer so they don't get freezer burn. If they get freezer burn, I don't imagine they will rise so well.

Update September 14, 2014: Yeast Donuts recipe was posted.