Pumpkin Baked Doughnuts are healthier doughnuts, baked (not fried) made with whole wheat flour and topped with Pumpkin Spice Cream Cheese Icing.
Clearly we all know what I love best about Fall…pumpkin recipes! We have gone pumpkin crazy over here this year, with pumpkin cake, muffins, pasta, cake again, and now doughnuts. After finally acquiring a couple doughnut pans, naturally my first go-to recipe is for Pumpkin Baked Doughnuts. 
Pumpkin Baked Doughnuts are simple to make – just mix all of the ingredients except for flour and then fold in the flour. Easy, right? Then just fill the wells in the doughnut pan and bake. I found spooning the batter into the wells of the doughnut pan to be awkward, but then it occurred to me that piping it in would be easier. I grabbed a Ziploc bag, filled the bag with batter, cut a corner off the bottom. Squeezing the bag to pipe the batter into the wells of the doughnut pan made it easy peasy.
Once the Pumpkin Baked Doughnuts were done, it was time to frost them. We all know that cream cheese goes so well with pumpkin, but what about a pumpkin-spice cream cheese icing? Yes please! The pumpkin spice flavoring is actually made using Coffee-mate liquid creamer. When I learned that Coffee-mate is a wonderful addition to seasonally-inspired recipes, I thought it was the most brilliant idea ever.
Coffee-mate offers two seasonal Fall flavors – Spiced Latte and Pumpkin Spice – and either one would go well in this recipe. The frosting recipe was inspired by this recipe, and I had some left over after icing my lovely doughnuts. The left over frosting is perfect between graham crackers or used in this simple recipe for Ginger Sandwich Cookies.
- Cooking spray
- ½ cup canola oil
- 3 eggs
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- ½ cup packed brown sugar
- 1½ cups pumpkin puree
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1½ teaspoons baking powder
- 1¾ cups + 2 tablespoons whole wheat pastry flour (or all-purpose flour)
- 4 tablespoons ⅓ less fat cream cheese, room temperature
- 2 tablespoons butter, room temperature
- 2 tablespoons Pumpkin Spice Flavor NESTLE COFFEE-MATE Liquid Coffee Creamer
- ½ teaspoon vanilla
- 1½ cups powdered sugar
- Preheat oven to 350F degrees. Spray doughnut pans with cooking spray and set aside.
- In a large bowl, beat oil, eggs, sugar, pumpkin, vanilla, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice and baking powder, until smooth.
- Add flour, gently folding until combined.
- Pour batter into a Ziploc bag and cut off a bottom corner. Pipe batter into the wells of the doughnut pans, filling about ¾ full.
- Bake doughnuts for 15 to 18 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
- Remove from oven and let cool in pan for about 5 minutes. Then gently remove doughnuts from pan to a wire rack to cool completely.
- PREPARE ICING: In a small bowl, beat cream cheese and butter until smooth. Add Coffee-mate and vanilla, beating until combined. Gradually beat in powdered sugar until thick and creamy. [Note: If too thick, add more Coffee-mate; If too thin, add more powdered sugar] Spread frosting over cooled doughnuts and decorate as desired.
Sources: Doughnuts – King Arthur Flour, Icing – Coffee-mate
