Cake Mix Baked Donuts

I asked for a donuts pan for Christmas...and I got one!!!  I've been looking at various recipes for baked donuts, but wanted one that used something that would be quick and easy...like cake mix.  After a couple of different searches, I came across this recipe.

What you'll need:
   1 box of cake mix
   2 large eggs
   1 stick of melted butter
   1 cup of milk

What to do:
   1. Preheat oven to 350.
   2. Mix everything together.
   3. Pour batter into a gallon sized zip top bag and cut about a 1/2 to 3/4 inch off one the bottom corners.
   4. Squeeze batter into sprayed donut pan.....now this is the tricky part.  The batter is thick and you'll only want to fill the donut sections less than half full (you'll see what I mean when we get to the pictures).
   5. Bake for 13-15 minutes....13 minutes was perfect.

After the donuts are cool, you can frost them if you want, but I'm not a big fan of frosted donuts.  Instead, I added chocolate chips to the batter.

Ok...see how full these sections are....TOO FULL!

And you end up with donut-muffins...

donut bottom, muffin top

Easiest way to fill the sections.

Second attempt turned out less muffin-like.

This is as full as the sections should get.

Hello, little ones!

Click here for the link to find out where I got the recipe.

Happy baking!

New School Puppy Chow

Puppy Chow is a treat that reminds me of two people.  The first I've known for more than 20 years.  She would always make puppy chow for church and youth functions, usually because we always requested it.  The second was my first and last college roommate.  We once trekked to the grocery store in more than a foot of snow, and by trekked I mean, on foot - there were no way our cars were getting out of the parking lot, for ingredients to make puppy chow and ugly dip.  It was AWESOME!!!

Did you know that you could use cake mix to make AMAZING tasting puppy chow?!  I didn't, until I found Pinterest.

I decided to make some Cake Batter Puppy Chow for tomorrow's staff meeting.  And of course, I had to make sure it was good enough for them and...I might actually like it more than regular puppy chow.

Here's what I used:
   1 box of rice chex cereal
   1 box of yellow cake mix
   3/4 c powdered sugar
   3/4 bottle of sprinkles
   9 cubes of white almond bark
   2 tsp vegetable shortening
   paper grocery sack

What I did:
Dumped the whole box of cereal in the paper sack.  Poured cake mix and powdered sugar in bowl.  Used a whisk to mix the two together.  Then added sprinkles and mixed again.  Placed the almond bark in a microwave safe container and then melted in microwave in 30 second intervals, stirring after each interval.  About half way through the melting process, I stirred in the shortening - this will thin out the chocolate mixture, making it easy to coat the cereal.  After chocolate was completely melted and shortening was well incorporated, I dumped it on top of the cereal and gave the bag a good shaking.  If the cereal isn't well coated, use a rubber scrapper to stir the cereal and chocolate until well coated.  Once it was well coated, I poured in the cake mix-ture, closed bag and gave it another good shake. After the cereal was coated with the cake mix-ture, I dumped it all out on wax paper I had laid out on the table to dry before putting in an air-tight storage container.

I may regret ever trying this recipe...it is really, really good!

I've seen several versions of this recipe on Pinterest, but the one I used for a base came from Six Sisters' Stuff.  Click here for the link to their recipe.

Happy cooking!