I always try to incorporate fun crafts and recipes for holidays to make them a little more special and fun to celebrate for the kids (I mean myself). I love teaching them about and celebrating the holidays through cooking together. I try to keep my recipes with the kids as simple as can be so for this little project we used a box mix to keep things easy.
WHAT YOU NEED
- donut box mix + whatever box calls for
- powder sugar (I used organic)
- milk (I used 2% but any will do)
- red coloring + blue coloring
- things for kids to mix and play with which for us typically includes sprinkles lots of cups bowls and spoons
Find a box or donut mix you like. I use stonewall products a lot because I always know I'm going to get a good high quality finished product even though it isn't the cheapest.
DIRECTIONS
Mix the donut mix per box directions or prep whatever recipe you are using. I used the mini donut pan instead because I just like that size better especially for kids.
Pipe the mixture into the pan half full or as directed on the box. Make sure to grease your pan (I used butter) so the mini donuts pop out easy.
MAKE THE ICING & DECORATE
For the icing you want to have it a little runny but still firm. I guess in baking they would call this "peeks" . Stick your fork in and pull up it should be firm enough to hold a peek at least for 10 seconds. Start with about 1 cup of powder sugar and then slowly add in milk. I would say I used about 1 1/2 cups of powder sugar all together because I ended up adding a little more and about 4 TBS milk. It should be runny (like a solid that's still runny) and mix with the other colors as well as drip off the donuts a little for a better effect.
In two separate bowls, add a few drops of red and blue for your patriotic colors. Add a couple TBS of each to a plate along with the white.
With a knife end or a toothpick give a few swirls to give a swirl effect.
Take one fresh baked donut after cooled and place on plate in the center of the mixed icing colors. With your donut staying in place spin the donut on the colors a few times to pick up the icing.
Repeat with about 10-12 donuts till the colors are completely mixed then refresh the icing so it still gives the same effect, otherwise it just mixes to a purple. I refreshed after it looked like the picture below.
FINISHED PRODUCT!
TIPS FOR DOING THIS WITH KIDS
If you don't have kids these are still delicious and good and would be a really quick fun peaceful (key word peaceful if you other moms feel me!) activity! I let Arabella do a lot of the prep work while I help her and I wore Windsor for this so she could observe. (That's the top of her head in piping pic above). Arabella has a mixing obsession so I let her do some mixing on the side, I guess she's creating magic potions (she's totally the cutest). She loves to pour stuff in and see what happens and mix and taste. So what I do is let her do simple things like crack an egg, but I do it in a separate bowl in case I have to pick out shells. Or just simply pouring in the melted butter and stirring. She typically wants to keep going and poor and mix after something is ready to bake so I take a separate bowl after we have our recipe ready and just give her random things (all edible not cooked) like flour, milk, water, and sprinkles and she can mix away and try it.
We did have a major spill of the giant bowl below of blue powder sugar water. Arabella actually had fun helping me clean it up after she got over the original spill shock of sticky all over clothes, feet, hands and body! After a quick bath & one mini pan of burned donuts later (while we were upstairs bathing and forgot about them) we changed into a Cinderella costume, came down and started decorating the cooled donuts. Don't ever spill sugar water, it's a disaster to clean up! After about 4 hands and knee scrub session it's finally the cleanest the floor has ever been but incredibly hard to clean!
You could totally do these for any holiday or just for fun with any colors of your choice or to reflect the holiday. My husband who doesn't eat sweets even liked these, they turned out super good and since they are mini if you have one or two you won't feel bad about it! Although ours are pretty much all gone!
Have fun with this one guys!
