Doughnut cakes and delicious sprinkles

I’ve got a thing for doughnuts at the moment. It’s coming into Summer here, and I think I just love the idea of a cinnamon doughnut on hot days. I’m always disappointed with the quality of bakery doughnuts – why don’t they ever taste like they did when I was younger?

I’ve started to wonder whether my standards were lower on my childhood, or whether doughnuts actually did just taste better. I made mini jam doughnut cupcakes recently, which satisfied my desire for crunchy, cinnamon sweetness, but Sunday afternoon calls for something a little bit special. This cake is moist and cinnamony and really sticky! I recommend cutting it with a sharp, thin knife so that your icing doesn’t cling to the knife too much!

I tried making my own sprinkles yesterday (and Instagrammed it, as I do everything – check them out here), so I put them to good use on my caramel doughnut cake.

Plain doughnut cake:

200g butter
1 ½ cups sugar
1 tsp vanilla
3 eggs
2 cups flour
1 tsp bicarb
½ tsp nutmeg
1 tsp cinnamon
¾ cup milk

Caramel icing:

½ cup sweetened condensed milk
1 tbsp golden syrup
½ cup brown sugar

Preheat your oven to 180°C. Grab a ring shaped tin and grease it. If you’re overly worrisome about cakes coming out in tact (like I am) trace the bottom of the pan onto baking paper and cut out a ring to line the bottom of the pan with.

Cream together your butter and sugar. The mixture will be quite crumbly, because, let’s face it, there’s a whole lot of sugar. Add in the vanilla, followed by the eggs, one at a time and combine well.

Add in the flour and mix thoroughly. Pop the bicarb, nutmeg and cinnamon into the mixture and combine. Pour the milk in slowly to thin the mixture out and make sure it’s all combined. Scrape down the sides of the bowl so that everything incorporates well.

Pour the batter into your prepared tin and smooth over with a spatula. Pop the cake in the oven for 45-50 minutes. It’s ready when a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean.
The icing for this recipe is super easy and doesn’t require icing sugar, which is handy because I often run out of it! Throw the sweetened condensed milk, golden syrup and brown sugar into a pan over a low heat and mix until the butter is melted. Allow the mixture to thicken up and keep it on the heat until it starts to thicken and bubble slightly.

Take the mixture off the heat and set to one side to cool for five minutes. It will thicken as it cools, so make sure you ice the cake while the icing is still warm. Top with some sprinkles (I made my own!!) and serve with a big glass of milk!