Wow, so just yesterday I debuted this blog on the internet, and it’s already motivating me and inspiring my cooking in amazing ways!

I was in the mall after school and decided to purchase a donut pan and some lavender extract, two things that have been in my amazon wishlist for awhile, but haven’t bought yet because of my need for instant gratification…so there they were in my shopping bag, and my mind was going wild with different things I could do with both items together.

These donuts were born from the initial brainstorm:

I’ve never created my own recipe until now…I had to do lots of research on a basic donut recipe and then veganized it and tweaked that a bit…I wanted my donuts to have a lavender like color, but did not want to use artificial colors, so I added some smushed up blueberries to give it the color. I am not a fan of the taste of blueberries except for the occasional good muffin, but these I can barely taste the blueberries in, which is fine by me. The glaze was really tasty in my opinion, but I might try to find a more icing type of frosting to make next time because I think it’ll look nicer. My family who tried them also said the amount of lavender I put in the glaze was a bit overpowering, so I changed the recipe a bit.

My cat Neko is a kindred scent spirit to me apparently, and shares my love of all things lavender. While the kitchen was scented with it’s essence, his nose was working hard trying to find the source of the smell, and he just hung out on the kitchen counter for a while looking quite relaxed.

Before I get to the recipe for these babies, I want to also share a review of what I use for the “honey.” It’s kind of awesome, because I don’t really like agave (I think it’s too much like high fructose syrup). It’s called Bee Free Honee and I think more vegans should try it! It’s made of apples and I can’t believe how close it comes to the taste of real honey from my memory of it. I give it:

Okay, okay, here’s the recipe:

Baked “Honey” and Lavender Donuts

Makes 6 donuts

Ingredients:

1 flax egg (1 tbsp flaxmeal and 3 tbsp water, whisked–let sit for a bit)

1/2 tbsp apple cider vinegar

1/2 Cup Vanilla Almond Milk (sweetened or unsweetened is fine, I used sweetened)

1/2 cup blueberries

2 tbsp bee free honee or agave (or even maple syrup)

2 tbsp unsweetened applesauce

1/4 cup vegan sugar

1 tsp lavender extract (I got mine at Sur La Table…you can probably get it at any good specialty cooking store or even Amazon where I originally saw it. This is the brand I bought there)

3/4 tsp baking powder

1/8 tsp baking soda

1 1/3 cup unbleached all-purpose white flour

Glaze:

2 tbsp almond milk

a couple drops (if possible) of lavender extract

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup organic powdered sugar

Dried lavender flowers or vegan sprinkles, for garnish

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
2. Make flax egg, whisk, and set aside in a small bowl.
3. In a measuring cup, pour the apple cider vinegar, and then fill up with the almond milk. Whisk and then set aside 5-10 minutes. This creates a vegan buttermilk substitute!
4. Mash blueberries with a potato masher in a bowl, or roughly in a food processor or blender. You don’t want them to be too liquid, but enough so they’re smooth and no longer resemble berries.
5. In a small mixing bowl, add flax egg, almond milk/apple cider vinegar mixture, “honey,” apple sauce, sugar, and lavender extract. Stir until combined.
6. Mix baking soda, baking powder, and flour together in a large mixing bowl.
7. Stir the powders and flour until combined and then add the wet ingredients into the bowl.
8. Fold in the blueberries.
9. Spray donut pan with cooking spray.
10. Spoon donut batter into pan cavities.
11. Put into the oven. Make sure you have the pan on top of a regular cookie sheet in case there’s any spill over for any reason!
12. Bake in oven for 10-12 minutes. You want them to be somewhat of a golden color.
13. Remove from oven and cool for 5 minutes.
14. Place on a cooling rack to completely cool.

To make the glaze: 

1. Heat almond milk with extracts in a small saucepan on low heat until warm, whisking occasionally so it doesn’t scorch.
2. Slowly add powdered sugar and whisk until smooth.
3. Dip donuts into glaze.
4. Quickly add vegan sprinkles or dried lavender flowers before glaze sets!
5. Om nom nom on them!

Some extra tips:

These are how my blueberries looked before I folded them in.

If you try the recipe, let me know how it goes! You can always contact me or comment about troubleshooting anything or getting some ideas how to tweak something (though I don’t guarantee they’ll work perfectly all the time). And if you make them for someone or something, or whatever, be sure to tell people where you found the recipe and about my blog 🙂 !!!