Mini Donuts & Cookies

For Mother's Day I made up some goodies for my mom. I found a recipe for homemade Nilla' Wafers since those are her all time favorite cookie. She once told me that when she was pregnant with me those were what she craved. She joked that the family said I should have been named "Nilla".

So I found a recipe that was supposed to be the closest thing to the Nabisco Nilla's & went to work. The cookies came out delicious, but not like Nilla's at all. I'm not sure if perhaps I did something wrong or if that's just how they are supposed to be. They tasted like a cross between shortbread & Nilla's. They were still VERY YUMMY. For me to say that about plain cookies means they were totally awesome. Normally I won't touch a cookie unless it's loaded with icing or chocolate or caramel or something super fattening!



Homemade Nilla Wafers:

1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup shortening
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups cake flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 tablespoon water

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
2. Cream together sugars, shortening, egg, vanilla, and salt in a large bowl.
3. Add the the flour and baking powder. Add 1 tablespoon of water and continue mixing until dough forms a ball.
4. Roll dough into 3/4-inch balls and flatten slightly onto a lightly greased cookie sheet. Bake for 15-18 minutes or until cookies are light brown. (http://www.topsecretrecipes.com)
Makes 50-56 cookies.

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After the Nilla Wafer baking was through I started in on the mini baked donuts! YUMMY!

Right before we moved into this new place I got very excited because we would have a working oven again... So I went on a mini shopping spree on amazon & boughtkitchen stuff & cookbooks, lol. One of the items I recently bought was a mini donut pan to make baked donuts.



This little pan is awesome! After whipping up the batter & pouring into the molds, you only have to wait 8mins for fresh, oh so yummy cake donuts. Now I've never really been a big fan of cake donuts, I personally prefer the fluffy, fattening fried ones... But these were good. They had a different texture to them, unlike any I've tasted before. The donuts did tend to stick abit after the first batch was done, so the second batch I let cool abit longer & then they came out just fine. The only real complaint that I have about this nifty pan is that it's kinda time consuming to use a spoon & fill up the molds. And that's not even a really major problem for me, in fact if I weren't preggy it most likely wouldn't have bothered me at all. But with pregnant back & feet...well you see where I'm going!

So I'm going to over look the time it took to fill up the pan & go ahead & give this cute little pan 5 outta 5 meows!
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Chocolate Cake Donuts:

1 & 1/2 cups flour
1/3 cup unsweetened baking cocoa
1 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp salt
2 eggs
2/3 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla (I substituted 3 Tbsp hazlenut syrup)
1/2 cup milk
2 Tbsp melted butter

Glaze:

1 cup powdered sugar
2 Tbsp HOT water (I substituted 2 & 1/2 Tbsp HOT coffee)

Preheat over to 325. Mix flour, cocoa, baking powder & salt. In separate bowl mix eggs, sugar & vanilla till thick. Combine milk & butter. Alternate between the egg mixture & milk mixture as you pour into the flour mixture. Blend till smooth. Spray pan lightly with non stick spray. Fill molds 2/3 full. Bake 8mns. Frost or glaze. ENJOY!