Baked Homemade Vanilla Chai Donuts

These donuts are baked, not fried, and loaded with sweet and spicy vanilla chai flavors!  For a more intense flavor, drizzle or dip in a chai glaze!

Have you ever tried homemade donuts?  These baked vanilla chai cake donuts are soft, fluffy,  full of amazing flavors, and ready in about 30 minutes!

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Making homemade donuts has been on my “to-do” list for a while now, and I finally did it a few weeks ago!  I went to my trusty resource, King Arthur Flour, and saw a great recipe for some vanilla chai donuts.  Man, it’s sure a winner!  Of course, I had to make a few tweaks to make them my own, you know I can’t follow a recipe without adding my own little twist 🙂

If you’ve never baked donuts before, they definitely taste different than the fried yeast donuts, so don’t expect that they’ll taste the same.  They’re cake-y… almost muffin like, but in that fun donut shape!  Plus, no waiting for the dough to rise or heating up oil.

One of my favorite thing to drink is Chai tea… specifically a Chai latte.  And not just in the morning… I usually have another cup of tea in the afternoon, when I hit that mid-afternoon energy drop.  When I don’t have any of my chocolate cherry energy balls that is!  So I love that these are FULL of chai flavors… mixed with that sweet hit of vanilla.  Vanilla chai has been a favorite flavor combination of mine for a while now (vanilla chai cheesecake bars anyone?).

Making these vanilla chai donuts is really simple…

The Breakdown:

• Whisk together your dry ingredients
• Beat wet ingredients in a mixing bowl
• Add dry ingredients to the wet ingredients until just combined
• Pour batter into donut pan
• Bake
• Toss in sugar
• Drizzle with glaze (optional)

You can also just dip the donuts in the glaze if you’d prefer.  I really love the sweet chai flavor of the glaze… it’s literally just two ingredients, powdered sugar and chai tea!

The smell that will come out of your kitchen when you’re making these vanilla chai donuts will be enough to send your entire household running into the kitchen to see what you’re cooking.  I hope you all give them a try!

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Baked Homemade Vanilla Chai Donuts

4.67 from 3 votes

Author: The Chunky Chef

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 10 minutes

Total Time: 25 minutes

Servings: 6 donuts + a few donut holes

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These donuts are baked, not fried, and loaded with sweet and spicy vanilla chai flavors! For a more intense flavor, drizzle or dip in a chai glaze!

Ingredients

• ▢ 1 cup all-purpose flour
• ▢ 1/2 cup brown sugar
• ▢ 1 tsp baking powder
• ▢ 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• ▢ 1/2 tsp ginger
• ▢ 1/2 tsp cardamom
• ▢ 1/4 tsp cloves
• ▢ 1/4 tsp allspice
• ▢ 1/4 teaspoon salt
• ▢ 1/4 cup strong brewed chai tea cooled
• ▢ 2 Tbsp vegetable oil
• ▢ 2 Tbsp vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
• ▢ 1 large egg
• ▢ CINNAMON SUGAR COATING:
• ▢ 6 Tbsp unsalted butter melted
• ▢ 1 cup granulated sugar
• ▢ 3/4 tsp ground cinnamon
• ▢ OPTIONAL CHAI GLAZE:
• ▢ 1 cup powdered sugar
• ▢ 1 Tbsp to 2 strong brewed chai tea

Instructions

• Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Spray donut pan with non-stick spray (I use Baker's Joy). Set aside.
• Combine 1 cup granulated sugar and 3/4 tsp cinnamon in a shallow baking dish, bowl, or paper bag. Set aside.
• In a mixing bowl, combine dry ingredients (flour, sugar, baking powder, spices and salt) and whisk.
• In another large mixing bowl, beat the chai tea, vegetable oil, vanilla bean paste, and egg until combined. I use a hand mixer for this.
• Add dry ingredients, half at a time, mixing until just combined after each addition, scraping the sides of the bowl if necessary.
• Pour batter into a pastry bag or large ziploc bag, snip off the tip, and fill donut molds of the pan about 2/3 full.
• Bake donuts 10-12 minutes, or until the spring back when lightly touched.
• Remove from oven and let cool in pan for 2-3 minutes.
• Invert pan over a cooling rack to remove donuts, dip them in melted butter, then toss them in the cinnamon sugar mixture.
• Return to cooling rack to finish cooling.
• If making the glaze, add powdered sugar to a mixing bowl and add tea, whisking to make a thick, yet pourable glaze.
• Drizzle over donuts, or serve in a small bowl for dipping.

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Chef Tips

1. Recipe slightly adapted from King Arthur Flour.
2. You can use any homemade or store-bought Chai spice you like, just make sure you use a total of 2 tsp.
3. To make donut holes, spray a mini muffin pan with non-stick spray, fill 2/3 full with batter, and bake as directed.

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