Apple Cider Donuts

By On Oct 28, 2022

These baked apple cider donuts are rich, soft, and filled with spiced apple flavor! Topped with a creamy apple glaze, they almost look too good to eat! They’re the perfect addition to any fall get-together.

Pumpkin spice gets a lot of love this time of year, but it’s time for apple desserts to be in the spotlight! You need to try this apple pecan crisp, apple tart, and tasty apple bread next!

Baked Apple Cider Donuts

Love donuts? Do you also love spiced apple desserts? This is the best combination of the two. These apple cider donuts are rich, moist, and filled with mouthwatering spiced apple flavor. One bite and you’ll be hooked!

These donuts have a moist, cakey texture that you’re going to love. With how soft and flavorful they are, you won’t be able to stop at one! The vanilla apple cider glaze on top not only makes these donuts look amazing, but adds an extra pop of flavor as well! They’ll be a hit at every fall gathering.

Ingredients You’ll Need

One of the best things about these apple cider donuts is that they use a lot of simple baking ingredients. You probably already have most of them on hand! Grab those apples on your counter and break out your spice rack! You can find all measurements below in the recipe card.

Apple Cider: Because apple is the main flavor here, we will be boiling this down to create a more concentrated version of apple cider!
Flour: Regular all-purpose flour works just fine!
Baking Powder and Baking Soda: You’ll need both to keep your donuts from becoming too dense.
Spices: Time to break out the spice rack! The tasty fall spices are what make these donuts so yummy! I used cinnamon, clove, allspice, nutmeg, and cardamom.
Salt: Just a pinch will enhance the overall flavor of your donut batter.
Butter: Butter makes everything better! It adds rich flavor and moisture to these apple cider donuts.
Egg: An egg will help bind all of the ingredients together.
Brown Sugar: I love using brown sugar here because it has a deeper, smokier flavor that pairs perfectly with apple and all of the spices.
Milk: I used whole-fat milk to keep the donuts moist.
Vanilla Extract: Your standard vanilla extract will work here, but I recommend using pure vanilla extract if you have it for the best flavor!
Shredded Apple: I tend to go for sweeter apples like Honeycrisp in my baking, but tart apples like Granny Smith work great, too!

Glaze:

Powdered Sugar: Powdered sugar gives the glaze its texture and also adds the perfect sweetness.
Apple Cider Drink Mix: This is an easy way to add a pop of apple flavor to frosting and glaze for all of your fall desserts!
Vanilla Extract: Helps to deepen the flavor of the glaze.
Milk: Used to adjust the consistency of the glaze.

How to Make Baked Apple Cider Donuts

Homemade donuts are the best! They’re even better filled with warm spices and comforting fall flavor. (If you’re a pumpkin lover, you’ll also have to try my baked pumpkin donuts!) This is a recipe you’ll want to come back to again and again, all season long!

Reduce Apple Cider: Firstly, reduce your apple cider to ½ cup. Bring the cider to a boil in a small saucepan, then reduce heat and let simmer uncovered for 30-50 minutes. Stir occasionally.
Shred Apple: Once you have reduced your cider to ½ cup, set aside to cool and shred your apple. Peel a large apple and shred it with a cheese grater, you will need to squeeze out some excess juice.
Preheat Oven, Prep Donut Pan: Preheat your oven to 350℉ and prepare your donut pan by spraying with nonstick spray.
Mix Dry Ingredients and Spices: In a bowl whisk together your flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, clove, allspice, nutmeg, cardamom, and salt.
Mix Wet Ingredients and Shredded Apple: In a separate bowl whisk together your butter, egg, brown sugar, whole milk, vanilla, and shredded apple.
Combine: Pour your wet ingredients and reduced apple cider into your dry ingredients. Whisk everything together until well combined, no clumps should remain.
Add to Pan: Pour your batter into your prepared donut pan. You can also use a piping bag with the tip cut off to pipe the batter into the pan, filling each cavity about halfway.
Bake: Bake for 10-12 minutes. To check doneness, tap the top of a donut, when it bounces back it is ready. Then, remove the donuts from oven and allow to cool in the pan 2-3 minutes.
Cool: Lastly, remove donuts from pan and allow to finish cooling on a wire rack before glazing.

To Make the Glaze:

Combine Ingredients: In a bowl, mix together your powdered sugar, apple cider mix, vanilla, and milk.
Dip: When your donuts have cooled, dip one side into glaze, allowing any excess glaze to drip off back into the bowl.
Garnish: (Optional) Dust with cinnamon.

3-photo collage of donut batter being prepared, added to a pan, and then baked donuts being glazed with frosting.

Tips and Variations

Here are a few extra tips (and some yummy variations) to ensure your apple cider donuts turn out just the way you like them!

Only Fill Half-Full: If you overfill the donut cavities your donuts will spill out and be misshapen, be careful to only fill half-full.
Add Glaze: I glazed only the tops of the donuts, you can glaze the whole donut if you’d like! For some variation, you can also skip the glaze and coat your apple cider donuts in cinnamon sugar.
Add Toppings: I like adding a little cinnamon on top for that picture-perfect finish. You can also add a drizzle of caramel sauce or melted white chocolate.

Top-down view of baked apple cider donuts on parchment paper.

Storing Leftover Donuts

The great thing about baked donuts is their dense texture allows them to stay good for nearly a week at room temperature! These apple cider donuts can double as a quick and easy breakfast!

At Room Temperature: Store leftover donuts in an airtight container for up to 5 days.

A stack of 3 donuts. The top donut has a bite taken out of it.