SOURCE: FINE COOKING #42 (ALSO AT FINECOOKING.COM)

I stumbled upon this recipe while browsing muffin recipes at Fine Cooking. I’ve made traditional jelly-filled doughnuts before, with yeast dough that gets deep-fried. These doughnut muffins caught my attention, although for some reason I waited a few weeks before trying the recipe.

As the name suggests, you’re essentially making a muffin that mimics a doughnut. A few things contribute to them resembling a doughnut…

First, you’re making more of a dough than a muffin batter. It starts with creaming butter with sugar and eggs, then mixing in dry and wet ingredients (more like making a thick cake batter). Instead of baking them in muffin liners, you’re baking them directly in a greased and floured muffin tin (don’t worry, they release very easily).

Second, once they’re cool enough to handle (but still warm), you dip them in melted butter and then roll in a cinnamon sugar mixture.

While they’re definitely not a traditional doughnut, they’re an addictive treat for a fraction of the effort. The outer edge has a decent bite without being too crusty, and the inside is tender and crumbly. The recipe makes 24 (which can be cooked in batches if you only have one muffin tin), but I halved the recipe to make 12, since I’m tying to be good while in quarantine 😉