Doughnut
Doughnuts can be made using a yeast-based bread dough (raised doughnuts), or a special type of cake batter. Cake doughnuts are often covered (on top) with a brightly coloured glace icing or chocolate. Some doughnuts are dredged in cinnamon sugar, while others are filled with jam or custard, briefly soaked in a sugary flavoured solution, or glazed. Some doughnuts are made with apple cider (the non-alcoholic kind) and are common at cider mills and farm markets. Many kinds of doughnuts are eaten warm.
Donuts have become a part of Western culture. The cartoon character Homer Simpson is especially fond of doughnuts, while popular mythology has American police officers addicted to them. There are entire chains of retail stores devoted to the selling of hot fresh doughnuts to eager customers, eg. Dunkin' Donuts, Krispy Kreme, Tim Hortons, Winchell's Donuts, Country Style and many other chain stores.
Other sweet fried pastries very similar to doughnuts include churros and fritters.
Doughnuts have a controversial history. One traditional story says that they imported into the USA by Dutch settlers.
Washington Irving's reference to "doughnuts" in 1809 in his History of New York is believed to be the first known printed use of the word.
Donuts are also mentioned in the Little House on the Prairie series by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Before the "newfangled" ring shape became common, doughnuts were often made as twisted ropes of dough. When placed into a pot of boiling fat, they floated until the lower half was cooked, then rolled themselves over to cook the other side. Ring doughnuts had to be flipped over by hand, which was more time-consuming.
A type of doughnut was recorded in the 19th century on the Isle of Wight, UK, with a different recipe from the type made in mainland Europe.
In Poland the round jam-filled doughnuts eaten especially - though not exclusively - during the Carnival are called pączki.
In Italy - zeppole.
In France and in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, there is an item called a beignet which is sometimes described as a French Donut but, as with other 'variants' of fried sweet pastry, the beignet typically has its own distinctive characteristics (shape and texture) which are sufficient in the minds of some of its devotees to object to Beignets being referred to as donuts.
Spain, Mexico and Brazil have the churro, which may not generally be thought of as a doughnut, but has similar characteristics. A churro is a thin cylinder of deep-fried pastry with a characteristic 'ridged' surface, due to being extruded through a star shaped hole. It is also popular in the US where it is sometimes referred to as a Spanish Doughnut or Mexican Doughnut.
In Germany, the doughnut equivalents are called Bismarckss or Berliners and don't have the typical ring shape but instead are solid. (German doughnuts are sometimes called Berlin Doughnuts in the USA.) John F. Kennedy once famously said "Ich bin ein Berliner", which amuses some commentators because it has a double meaning: both "I am a citizen of Berlin" and "I am a jam (jelly) doughnut".
In Holland, there is a type of pastry item called Oliebollen which is referred to in recipe books as Dutch Doughnuts (or occasionally as 'Dutch Donuts') which contain pieces of apple and/or dried fruit like raisins, and is traditionally eaten as part of new year celebrations.
In the Hudson Valley (which includes the Catskill Mountains) in New York State, USA, a doughnut is sometimes called an olicook, which derives from the Dutch Oliekoeke or 'oil cake' (sometimes also called olykoecks).
In the Ukraine there are recipes for fried dough based Pampushky which include both a sweet filled donut and a 'garlic roll' variety. Pampushka are also sometimes referred to as being Russian donuts.
Overview
History
Types
Trivia
Doughnuts, as ring shaped items, are an important explanatory tool in the science of topology where the ring donut shape (a ring with a circular cross section) is called a torus or toroid, and an example of using the ring doughnut as an illustrative term can be found in popular explanations of the Poincaré Conjecture.External link