Baked Mini Pączki (doughnuts)
Skinnier doughnuts? Yes please! Instead of frying them in oil we can bake them, which will make them nice and fluffy without grease.
This recipe is really easy and fun to make. You can fill them up with any filling you like, jam, sweet quark, or chocolate. I made my mini pączki the traditional way, with rose jam. Highly recommend it, a great fragrance, no need to put too much in it as it’s strong in taste and quite sweet. We don’t need more than one teaspoon in each doughnut.
Polish people love a good traditional fried pączek from time to time. We even have a national day called “Fat Thursday” which is the last Thursday before Lent, doughnuts seem like a great idea to stuff your face with before the big fasting. Nowadays is more about who can eat more in one sitting of these fluffy, greasy, and sweet treats. I think my max is 2 of the traditional big pączki, I know, pathetic!
That’s why I love this recipe for a healthier version and much smaller. No more utter guilt once you finish but still hits the sweet tooth.
Baked Mini Pączki (doughnuts)
Ingredients
- 125 ml Warm Milk
- 14 g Dry Yeast
- 500 g Plain Flour
- 70 g Sugar
- 1 tsp Salt
- 4 Medium Eggs
- 250 g Melted Butter
- 500 g Jam of your choice
- Candied Orange Peel optional
For Icing (optional)
- 4 tbsp Icing Sugar
- 1-1.5 tbsp Lemon Juice
Instructions
- Combine flour, yeast, and salt in a large bowl. Melt sugar in a cup with warm milk.
- Add milk and melted butter to the bowl with flour and yeast, following with eggs. Mix all well together with your hands and knead until the dough is smooth and won’t stick to your hands. You can add more flour if necessary.
- Place the ready dough in a large bowl, cover with a tea towel, and set aside for 1 hour in a dry and warm place.
- After resting the dough, knead again for few minutes. Roll the ready dough with a rolling pin until you end up with a large up to 2 cm thick pancake. Using a large drinking glass cut out as many circles as possible.
- Fill each circle with 1 tsp of jam and pinch the sides together forming a small ball. Place each doughnut in paper cupcake forms laid out on a baking tray. Set aside for 30 min for the second proofing.
- Preheat the oven to 180C. After 30 min brush each doughnut with egg white wash and bake for 15 min.
- To make the icing, simply combine icing sugar and lemon juice in a small bowl. Once the mini doughnuts are completely cooled down you can dip them in icing and decorate with orange peel pieces.
- Enjoy straight away. Keep in box with lid for up to 3 days.