Old-Time Doughnuts

Want to be a hero? Just get an OLD Betty Crocker cookbook and try a recipe - like doughnuts.

I made these Old-Time Doughnuts on Memorial Day. We usually don't get to travel/go to the lake/visit friends and family/etc. over Memorial Day weekend thanks to corn and/or soybean planting . . . so I decide to make up for it by frying something. I know, it's weird - and BAD for us - but it's only once a year!

Last year I fried homemade onion rings, this year I chose doughnuts. My husband went crazy over these, claiming they were a perfect replica of the doughnuts his great-aunt used to make. She must have had the Betty Crocker Picture Cookbook too!

Old-Time Doughnuts
(These seem like a cross between a cake dougnut and a glazed (yeast) doughnut)

Beat well: 2 eggs

Beat in: 1 cup sugar
2 tbsp. butter

Stir in: 3/4 cup buttermilk

Sift together and stir in: 3 1/2 cups flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. cinnamon

Chill dough 2 hours. On a floured surface, roll out dough to 1/3-inch thick (this dough rolls out beautifully). Cut with a floured doughnut cutter (or cookie cutters if you don't have a doughnut cutter - and honestly, who does have one?). Heat fat/oil while rolling and cutting doughnuts . . . When oil reaches 390 degrees, use a wide metal spatula to transfer dough into oil. Fry as many at one time as you can easily turn. Turn doughnuts as they rise to the surface and begin to turn brown. Fry about 3 minutes total, or until each side is golden brown. Carefully remove doughnuts from the oil and transfer to a plate lined with paper towels. Allow to cool for a moment. To coat with sugar, place one doughnut at a time in a paper bag with sugar - shake well. Serve immediately.
Yield: 2 dozen 3-inch doughnuts
- Recipe from Betty Crocker's Picture Cookbook (1950)