Cherry Vanilla Bean Donuts

I'm so excited about this post.  I've been waiting a long time to share it with you, and frankly it's hard for me to keep a secret.  But I did!  This is a recipe swap I did along with some of my blogger pals.  Each of us were assigned a blog to choose a recipe from, and today is the day everything gets revealed!  It's just as much of a surprise for all of us as it is for you.  Join me on this fun adventure:

I was tasked with choosing a recipe from my pal Jenny's blog, Honey and Birch.  Let me tell you, that was not an easy thing to do.  Her pictures are absolutely gorgeous and I was drooling over everything I looked at!  I was really torn between the Roasted Red Pepper and White Bean Hummus (because hummus is yummus) and the Homemade Buffalo Sauce for Wings because I love anything that has Buffalo Sauce.  I've never made my own, and after looking at Jenny's blog I will be soon!  Then I went to the grocery store and found the biggest, brightest, juiciest cherries.  I bought them for their beauty with no particular recipe in mind.  As I was browsing Honey and Birch, I found Jenny's recipe for Baked Cherry Vanilla Bean Doughnuts, and I knew immediately what I would be making for this post.  Fresh cherries baked into a yummy donut, flavored with vanilla bean?  There's no way you can go wrong with that.

One of the hardest parts of keeping my recipe choice a secret was National Donut Day.  The day I made this recipe, everyone was talking about National Donut Day on social media.  I wanted to share a picture so bad and tell everyone about the donuts that I was making!

This recipe went together in no time.  As Jenny suggested, I had all of the ingredients ready to go, including pitting and chopping the fresh cherries.  Do you have a cherry pitter?  I don't.  But don't fear, I found the perfect way to improvise:

If you've got a frosting tip from a pastry set, then that's all you need to quickly pit a pile of fresh cherries for these delicious donuts!

Here they are freshly baked and cooling in the donut pan.  It was so hard to wait on these.  I was dying to try one as soon as possible!  You can find my donut pan HERE.

And cooling completely.  Aren't they a gorgeous golden brown?  I could have stopped here, but what's a donut without a glaze?  Jenny's Very Vanilla Bean Glaze was perfect atop these donuts!

Yum!  Three donuts for a serving isn't too much right?  I put these out on the platter to photograph but I decided they were missing a little something...

A cherry on top of course!  Everything is better with a cherry on top.  Now there is no mistaking what flavor these donuts are.

I'm so glad I found this recipe.  Not only was it a blast truly making donuts on National Donut Day, but that evening one of my best friends and her girls stopped by to drink a Coke.  I had these delicious donuts waiting on my counter for dessert.  The ideal way to celebrate National Donut Day.  With a cold drink and a good friend.


Baked Cherry Vanilla Bean Donuts

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup milk
4 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon white vinegar
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 vanilla beans, cut down the middle, scraped of seeds (I used vanilla bean paste instead)
1 large egg
1 cup cherries, pitted, cut into 8 pieces

Glaze

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
3 tablespoons melted butter
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 tablespoon milk

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.  Grease the donut pan with extra butter or cooking spray and set aside.  In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt.  Set aside.  Combine the milk, butter, vinegar, vanilla extract, vanilla seeds and egg in a small saucepan over medium heat.  Stir constantly until the butter melts.  Add butter mixture to flour mixture and with a wooden spoon, stir to combine.  When the mixture is combined, fold in the cherries.  Spoon or pipe the mixture into the prepared donut pan.  Bake for 13-14 minutes until the finished donut edges come off the pan. Remove from oven and let cool for 1 minute, then finish cooling on rack.  If using the same pan again, wait 5 minutes before filling the pan a second time.

For the glaze, combine all ingredients in a small bowl with a wire whisk.  Wait 1-2 minutes for the glaze to thicken before dipping the donuts in the glaze. 

Freaky Friday Participating Bloggers:

A Dish of Daily Life
Life Currents
Cafe Terra
Pic-Nic
Who Needs A Cape?
Big Rigs 'n Lil' Cookies
Honey & Birch
The Devilish Dish
Giramuk's Kitchen-Food & Recipe Blog
An Affair from the Heart
Aunt Bee's Recipes
Full Belly Sisters
The Foodie Affair
Wildflour's Cottage Kitchen
A Kitchen Hoor
Belle of the Kitchen
LeMoine Family Kitchen
The Magical Slow Cooker
Christine It

I hope that you'll take the time to give these donuts a try.  They were simple and very delicious.  I'll be making them again soon, especially while fresh cherries are abundant.  Be sure and stop by Honey and Birch and see all of the other yummy things she has in store for you!


Also, don't forget the visit the other Freaky Friday blog participants.  You'll be sure to add to your recipe favorites...

An InLinkz Link-up