Friday, September 6, 2013

Maple Bacon Donuts


leaves and flours vegan gluten free maple bacon donuts

I have heard every sort of argument for whether the baked good above is spelled doughnut or donut. I've been told that fried versions are spelled doughnut, and baked cake versions are spelled donut. I've heard that artisanal shops are the ones who can use doughnut, but fast food chains need to use the abbreviated spelling. This is a subject I have thought long and hard about. I generally use "donut" because it's less letters to type, and if I am anything, it is concise.
A few weekends ago while I was driving home TED radio hour came on. When I heard the topic was big data & culturomics I almost turned the program off. Luckily I refrained because it answered some of my questions about the usage of "doughnut". These two scientists, Erez Lieberman Aiden and Jean Baptiste Michel, teamed up with Google to create something called Ngram Viewer. It's basically a highly addictive program that allows you to look at the use over words over extended periods of time. What this all boils down to is that while Teddy Roosevelt suggested changing the spelling to donut in the early 1900s in an effort to abbreviate the English language to make it easier to learn, it didn't pick up any momentum. And the spelling "donut" wasn't really used until 1950 when Dunkin Donuts opened in Boston! Ta-da. Here's your cultural lesson of the day. Apparently there's still a lot of heated debate between the Oxford English Dictionary and Garner's Modern American Usage about which spellings can be used in which contexts, but who really cares about the nitty gritty. Let's get to the sweets!

leaves and flours vegan gluten free maple bacon donuts leaves and flours vegan gluten free maple bacon donuts leaves and flours vegan gluten free maple bacon donuts

I used BabyCake's cake donut recipe from BabyCakes Covers the Classics for the base. I am not partial to bean flours, but the quarter cup of vanilla extract goes a fair way in covering up that flavor. It had a nice consistency, and I will definitely make the donuts again. The glaze is simply powdered sugar, maple syrup, and a bit of Frontier maple flavor. I don't know how to properly measure things for glaze, because I tend to just mix things until I get both the right flavor & consistency. I also sprinkled on Phoney Baloney coconut bacon because we had a bit in the cabinet, but I highly suggest making your own! It's so easy. My favorite recipe is from Cupcakes & Kale, but most of them are fairly similar. Just go easy on the liquid smoke or your house will smell like a campfire for weeks.

10 comments:

  1. What an interesting combination of flavors!
    Thanks so much for sharing!
    Shashi @ http://runninsrilankan.com

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  2. Maple + bacon sounds like a fantastic combo that I've still got to try! Thanks for the idea!
    And have a nice weekend :-)

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  3. omg. love your history of the word donut! I use the short form usually - mostly because I'm scared of mis-spelling the longer word!

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    1. I still can't figure out why way I will sway now that I know it's Dunkin Donut's fault. :)

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  4. i'm so into the history of this word! also into 1/4 c. of vanilla— yowza!

    i need to do some sort of challenge where i force myself to cook gluten free food to get over my fear/skepticism of it. also, raw food. ha! i'm a jerk

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  5. 1) I'm pretty sure I stalked these on Instagram the other day? and pointed my gluten free vegan friend who just got a mini doughnut pan your way.

    2) Well, yum.

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    1. ahh! i love when internetting collides. i recently realized that one of my favorite bloggers was someone i have been following on instagram for a while, but never connected that it was the same person!

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  6. OK these look absolutely awesome! I love the sweet and salty combination and they are so pretty, too!

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  7. I no longer care how the word is spelled...I want those in my mouth.
    *droolsonkeyboard*

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