Ice-Cream and Giggles

Ah, the lamington. The sponge cake, sandwiched with cream and jam, rolled in chocolate and sprinkled with coconut. The ultimate Australian classic perfect for Australia day.

I decided to take this traditional dessert up a notch by combining it with my favourite treat: donuts. I made a baked gluten free donut, sliced and filled it with whipped coconut cream, raspberries and jam, topped it with a chocolate ganache and, the finishing touch, coconut. Yum doesn't quite cover it!

Serves 6-8.

Prep: 20 minutes, baking: 12 minutes. Cooling: 30 minutes. Total time: roughly 1 hour.

You will need:

For the donuts:
 
1 tbsp ground flax seeds soaked in 2.5 tbsp water
2 tbsp melted vegan margarine
1/3 cup coconut sugar
1/2 cup unsweetened almond milk
1 cup buckwheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp vanilla essence

For the filling and assemblage:

Approximately 4 tbsp berry jam of choice
1 x 400 ml coconut cream, refrigerated overnight
80 g sugar free vegan chocolate
12-18 raspberries
Coconut shreds

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. For the donuts, mix the flax egg, vegan margarine, sugar, almond milk, vanilla and baking powder and soda in a bowl. Sift in the flour. Mix.
2. Pour mix into a piping bag, and pipe into a donut tin. Makes 6-8 donuts. Bake for 10-12 minutes.
3. Let the donuts cool for at least 30 minutes, then slice horizontally.
4. Meanwhile, spoon out the coconut cream into a bowl, discarding water. Whip.
5. In a saucepan, melt 80 g of the chocolate with 6 tbsp of the coconut cream (keep the rest of the cream for the filling). Whisk until combined. Let cool to room temperature (the fridge helps to speed up this process).
6. Fill each donut with whipped coconut cream, jam, and 2 raspberries sliced in half. Pour the ganache on top of the donut, and sprinkle shredded coconut on top. Serve!

These donuts were inspired by a trip I took to Melbourne about 6 months ago. I went to a vegan bakery and bought all these delicious vegan donuts, and one was a sausage style donut filled with mock cream and jam. So decadent, I just had to have a go at 1) making mock cream and 2) making donuts (again). Apart from brownies (i.e. chocolate) and ice cream, donuts have to be my favourite treat.

Prep: 60 minutes, Cooking: 20 minutes, Rising: 1 hour 15 minutes. Total Time: 3 hours 5 minutes.

Makes 5 - 6 donuts.

You will need:

For the donuts (recipe altered from here):

1/2 tbsp natvia sugar
160-185 ml warm water
1 tsp dry yeast
1 tbsp melted vegan margarine
1 1/2 cup plain flour or bakers flour
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp natvia sugar
1/2 tsp baking powder

For the mock cream:

1/4 cup vegan margarine
65 g natvia icing sugar mix
approx. 1.5 tbsp boiling water
1 tsp ice cold water

Plus sugar free jam, for the filling and more icing sugar for dusting.

Method:

1. In a bowl or bread maker, add 1/2 cup warm water, 1/2 tbsp natvia sugar, yeast and salt. Let rest for 5 minutes, then add the rest of the ingredients. If too crumbly, add 1 tbsp of warm water at a time until a dough is formed (I added 4 tbsp more). Let the machine knead the dough for 30 minutes.
2. Remove the dough, place in a bowl, cover in plastic and let rise for an hour.
3. Cut the doughnuts into desired shape (e.g. circle, with hole, sausage). Place on a lined baking tray and let rise for 15 minutes.
4. While donuts are rising, slowly heat some vegetable oil in a deep saucepan. Once simmering, but not too hot (if too hot the doughnuts will burn on outside and won't cook the inside), add one doughnut at a time, cooking for approx. 3 minutes, making sure you flip the donut halfway.
5. Once they have been cooked, prep the mock cream. In a bowl, dissolve the icing sugar in some boiling water (1/2-1 tbsp). Mix. In another bowl, beat the vegan butter until creamy and almost white. Add the icing sugar mix slowly for around 10 minutes. Add 1 tsp boiling water, beat, then add 1 tsp ice cold water, and beat again.
6. Decorate your donuts! I sliced the sausage donuts and filled them with cream and jam, then dusted everything with icing sugar.

Donuts are one of my obsessions. Nothing can quite compare to a hot cinnamon donut from a bakery, slightly oily, sweet and fluffy. Ah, those were the days when I could eat 6 donuts and wake up with a flat stomach the next morning. Alas, those times are gone, but at least I can still make vegan donuts that taste like nutella, are gluten free and refined sugar free!

Prep: 12 minutes, baking, 10 minutes. Cooling: 15 minutes: Total Time: 35-50 minutes.


Makes around 9 donuts.


You will need:

1 tbsp ground flax seeds soaked in 2.5 tbsp water
1/3 cup coconut sugar
2 tbsp melted vegan margarine
1/2 cup unsweetened almond milk
1/4 cup melted loving earth hazelnut chocolate butter or a vegan nutella option
1 cup buckwheat flour
1 tsp gf baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tbsp cacao powder

Plus around 50 g of chocolate for icing (I used salted caramel and dark)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
2. In a bowl, add to the flax egg the coconut sugar, margarine, almond milk and chocolate hazelnut butter. Whisk.
3. Sift in the flour, baking powder and soda, then add cacao powder. Mix.
4. Pour into a piping bag, and pipe into a lightly greased donut tin.
5. Bake for 8-10 minutes.
6. Let cool for around 10-15 minutes, then dip into some melted chocolate!

I hope you're not sick of donuts! Cause I am NOT! After eating lots of deep fried donuts (but vegan) lately, I felt it was time I made some more homemade healthy-ish donuts! These are rose and pistachio, which actually go really well together? Who would have thought!

Makes 9 medium sized donuts.

Prep: 10 minutes, cooking 8 minutes. Icing: 10 minutes: Total time: 28 minutes.

You will need:

For the donuts:

1 tbsp ground flax seeds
2.5 tbsp water
2 tbsp vegan margarine (melted)
1/3 cup coconut sugar
1/2 cup almond milk
dash of salt
1 cup buckwheat flour (or use a GF mix if you don't like the taste of buckwheat)
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder

For the icing: 

2 tsp melted margarine
2 tbsp almond milk
1/2 cup natvia sugar free icing sugar
1 tsp rose essence
few drops of vegan red food colouring

Plus approx. 3 tbsp ground pistachios and 4 tbsp chopped pistachios.

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Combine wet ingredients in a bowl with the flax seeds. Sift in the dry, hand mix.
2. Pour into a piping bag, and pipe into a donut tin to get even donuts. Smooth over the tops as necessary.
3. Bake in oven for 8-10 minutes. 
4. Mix all ingredients for icing in a bowl. Then using a spatula, carefully smooth icing over the donut. Due to the nature of natvia icing sugar, simply dipping the donut in the icing won't work. Sprinkle with a combination of ground and chopped pistachios.

A few months ago I spotted this blog post which had donut ice-cream sandwiches. I saw it, knew I wanted to make it, and bookmarked it. However, there was the tiny problem of finding the perfect vegan donut in order to make them. I tried numerous batches of baked donuts. But they just wouldn't cut it. I eventually realized that if indeed I did want the perfect donut, it would need to be deep fried. I used this recipe for the donuts, and lo and behold! I did have the perfect donut, just in time for summer to make donut ice-cream sandwiches! Now, I am sure you are thinking: no. You can't combine the two greatest desserts together and get away with it. It's too much of a good thing! But actually, they go well together. And it doesn't matter if your donuts are stale. It just doesn't. I was actually surprised how perfect it was. So will you be one to try the donut ice-cream sandwich?

It should make enough ice-cream for 3 donut ice-cream sandwiches.

Prep: 5 minutes.

You will need:

3 donuts (for best results, use this recipe if you are making your own)
2 frozen bananas
1/2 cup thawed blackberries

1. Slice you donuts in half.
2. Combine the bananas and blackberries in a food processor until combined.
3. Place one scoop of ice-cream per donut.
4. Eat!

After getting a lot of responses on instagram asking for the recipe of my vegan gluten free caramel mudcake donuts, I thought I would post them here. I actually made this recipe for a Loving Earth competition, so here's hoping that I win! I know that this is an ice-cream blog, but I was thinking of perhaps mixing it up a little, and adding different kinds of recipes? Let me know what you think! Anyway, these donuts are delicious and caramel-ly, vegan, gluten-free and refined sugar-free (well, except for the sprinkles, but you can all forgive a little sprinkle lovin' every now and again, right?).

Time: approx 50 minutes (15 min prep, 15 min baking, 20 minutes cooling)

Makes 6 large donuts

You will need:

For the donuts:

1/4 cup potato flour
1/4 cup LSA meal
1/4 cup coconut flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
dash salt
2 tbsp vegan margarine
1/4 cup almond milk
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
1/4 cup maple syrup
50 g Loving Earth Caramel Choc Alternatively, you could also use 50 g of vegan white chocolate!

Icing:

50 g Loving Earth Caramel Chocolate. If you don't have access to caramel chocolate, you could dip it in white chocolate or making caramel icing; something like this.

Optional:

Vegan Sprinkles*

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celcius (fanforced)
2. Sift flours, baking powder and salt together in a bowl.
3. In a separate bowl, mix the melted margarine, almond milk, vanilla and maple syrup.
4. Melt 50g of caramel choc in the microwave in a bowl (at 30 second intervals) until smooth.
5. Add caramel to wet mixture and mix well.
6. Form a well in the dry mix. Slowly add wet mix to the dry until combined. Do not overmix.
7. Divide mix in a donut pan (keeping in mind it should make 6 largish donuts), and fill each 3/4 way up. Smooth out mixture if necessary.
8. Baking in the oven for 10-12 minutes or until golden brown.
9. Cool donuts for at least 20 minutes.
10. Melt the remaining 50 g of caramel chocolate in the microwave, again at 30 second intervals. Dip each donut in the caramel, then top with sprinkles!
11. Serve! I served mine with a banana-cacao-maca-almond milk smoothie!



*Just kidding. They're not optional! Every donut needs sprinkles.