Baked Chocolate Peanut Butter Donuts with Vanilla Peanut Butter Glaze – Soft chocolate-peanut butter donuts are the best of all worlds because you get chocolate and peanut butter in one easy dessert. Because they’re baked rather than fried like traditional donuts, they’re healthier so of course you can feel free to have seconds!
You may have seen this recipe coming. I mean, come on.
Chocolate and peanut butter. I had to.
The vanilla glazed donuts, i.e. Krispy Kreme donuts And the cinnamon bun with cream cheese frosting donuts, i.e. Cinnabons in donut form, were lovely but.
The combination of chocolate and peanut butter will always hold a special place in my heart.
And these have been holding a special place in my heart and in my stomach the past few days.
The peanut butter keeps them extra moist. So moist and dense you may think they were fried, but they’re baked.
Does baking them mean they’re somehow better for you than fried and therefore you can go ahead and have seconds? Or thirds? Sure, I’ll go with that logic.
The scent of chocolate and peanut butter wafting through your house while these are baking is intoxicating. You’re forewarned.
But unlike chocolate cake or brownies which take much longer to bake, you’ll only be tempted for about 10 minutes while these babies bake.
And while they’re baking, you can make the vanilla peanut butter glaze.
Try not to lick the glaze-mixing spoon too many times while you wait for them to come out of the oven.
This is what they looked like fresh out of the oven and naked, BG (Before Glazing)
If for some reason you’re crazy you don’t like peanut butter, you could make a Cream Cheese Glaze or a basic Vanilla Glaze
But I happen to love peanut butter so the glaze choice was obvious for me.
If you don’t have a donut pan, you should get one. $8 bucks with a coupon and well worth it but if you don’t have one and you’re desperate to get your chocolate peanut butter fix on pronto, you can make these as muffins as suggested in the recipe.
Donuts seem more fun to eat than muffins though.
And these were very fun to eat.
I especially liked licking the vanilla-infused peanut butter glaze from my fingers. The sweet glaze balanced out the chocolate donuts which were not overly sweet. The donuts have a rich, dark chocolate flavor rather than a ‘sweet’ or milk chocolate flavor. They remind me of Flourless Chocolate Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies but in donut form.
Skylar and I were a sticky, peanut-buttery, chocolatey mess after we got done with these.
Her hair was getting in her eyes and face a bit while she was eating her donut and I had to remind her, “Honey, don’t touch your hair until after we wash our hands.”
Nothing like a little peanut butter in your hair to keep it soft and shiny and a little cocoa powder and chocolate streaked through your hair to accentuate your lowlights. The donuts were so worth a little hair mess. That’s what shampoo is for. No biggie.
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Baked Chocolate-Peanut Butter Donuts with Vanilla-Peanut Butter Glaze
Ingredients
Donuts
- 2 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
- 2 tbsp creamy peanut butter, melted
- ¾ c all-purpose flour
- ⅓ c granulated sugar
- ¼ c unsweetened natural cocoa powder, I used Trader Joes but you could try Hershey’s Dark or any favorite
- 1 tsp baking powder
- ¼ tsp cinnamon
- ½ c buttermilk, you could use regular milk/cream/vegan milk + 1/2 tsp vinegar, to mimic buttermilk if you don’t keep buttermilk on hand
- 1 large egg
- ½ tsp vanilla extract
Glaze
- 1 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
- 2 tbsp creamy peanut butter, melted
- ⅓ c or more powdered sugar
- ½ tsp vanilla extract, use more if you like a stronger vanilla flavor
- 1 tbsp+ milk or cream, as needed for consistency
Instructions
- Donuts
- Pre-heat oven to 325F degrees and lightly grease or cooking-spray the donut pan (or muffin tin). I use this Wilton doughtnut pan. Pans vary by size but this is not a “huge” recipe. Double or triple the recipe as desired. For the extra bit of batter, rather than waiting for my one donut pan to come out of the oven, I made two small muffins in a muffin pan with it. It took about 15 minutes for the muffins to cook through.
- In a small bowl, soften/melt the butter and peanut butter in the microwave, about 15- 30 seconds. Stir to combine.
- In a large bowl, mix together flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, buttermilk, egg, and vanilla. Stir to combine.
- Then add in the melted butter/peanut butter mixture and stir to combine.
- Use a pastry bag fitted with a large round tip (or a Ziploc bag with a corner cut off) to pipe the batter into a 6-donut pan. Or just be extra neat and do this with a spoon which is what I did.
- Bake 8 to 11 minutes in the preheated oven, until doughnuts spring back when touched or until dough is set. Donuts will should be springy. (I always underbake my baked goods but in my oven these took 10-11 minutes to set up)
- Allow to cool slightly before removing from pan, about 5 minutes. While donuts are baking or cooling, make the glaze.
- Glaze (makes slightly more glaze than you’ll likely need if you’re glazing only the top half of the donuts. Store extra in the refrigerator for a later use or add to a smoothie, coffee, eat with a spoon, glaze the entire donut)
- In a small bowl, soften/melt the butter and peanut butter in the microwave, about 15-20 seconds. Stir to combine.
- Add the powdered sugar and vanilla to the melted butter/peanut butter mixture and stir.
- Slowly add the water or milk, one teaspoon at a time, until desired consistency is achieved.
- Dip the donuts into the glaze and add sprinkles or other garnishes as desired.
- To make Gluten Free: use your favorite gluten free flour blend. To make Vegan: My suggestion is be to replace the buttermilk with almond milk or full fat coconut milk (because it’s thicker like buttermilk) and add 1 tsp vinegar as noted in the recipe to mimic buttermilk; increase the amount of baking powder and/or add baking soda. Use melted margarine or Earth Balance, and use a flax/chia egg rather than regular egg.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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Eggnog doughnuts! Make it happen! :P
Oh Yeah Mama! YUM YUM YUM!
Thanks Averie. I was looking forward to this recipe of yours and now I will just finally go buy my doughnut pan. :)
I literally just bought a donut pan today and this recipe will be my first donut attempt! Can’t wait and great photos!
Enjoy!!!!
oh MY!! Im with Lisa! Wow!! Thanks for your sweet email! I want to meet you one day soon!!
OH. MY. GOODNESS. I want these RIGHT this very second!! These sound/look incredible!
Can’t get any better than chocolate and peanut butter! Yum!
It’s simply not fair, the number of delicious looking baked donut recipes floating around the blogosphere. I still, somehow, don’t have a donut pan, and it looks like I’m missing out! I hear crate & barrel calling my name. These donuts need to be in my life, right now!
Best donuts I’ve ever had were in San Francisco’s Ferry Building. I had a vegan pumpkin spice one and a regular custard-filled one. Swooooon.
But chocolate and peanut butter? Be still my heart!!
Oh I need a donut pan too! Those look incredible!!
aaaaaand I’m officially convinced. I’m buying a doughnut (or is it donut?) pan pronto!
I realllly need to jump on this donut train. Vanilla peanut butter glaze sounds aaammmaazzzinnng!
Those look so good but really any donut I usually like. I really like those cake type blueberry donuts. I really dont eat donuts anymore because of the health factor but would love to make my own baked ones. I have been wanting one of those pans too, maybe Ill get one for Christmas!!
I so need a donut pan! I love all flavours and types of cake and donuts and cookies and candies and everything else sweet. I am not picky in that department at all.
Have you ever been to Canada and had Tim Horton’s donuts? Or specifically, timbits? They’re not vegan and nowhere near healthy, but oh man they are good. Different than Krispy Kreme but just as good it their own way.
Those are some of the most professional donuts I’ve ever seen — so uniform and pretty! Great photos, too (as usual).
Thank you so much, Gena. That is very kind of you to say…I really appreciate it :)
Mmm, it’s recipes like this one that make me really wish that Liam liked peanut butter in baked goods!
Do you think I could get away with making a batch of doughnuts just for myself?!! ;) The kids would, I’m sure, love them but they’d probably only eat a quarter of a doughnut at a time!
Do you think these would freeze well?
I love the photos with the glaze dripping down – makes me want to bite into one of these doughnuts right now! :-D
you could make with another nut butter or just omit it and make chocolate donuts…alter the flour/cocoa powder a bit as needed.
freeze well? Not sure…it only makes 6 fairly small donuts so not really tons of leftovers. I’d just keep them in a container on the counter for a couple days if you really think you won’t eat them all within the first 36 hrs :)
Unfortunately he’s against any kind of nut butter in baked goods…so annoying! The only way he’ll eat nut butter is plain on toast or with apple slices.
But I don’t want chocolate doughnuts, I want these chocolate-pb doughnuts! ;) he even tasted the peanut butter in your caramel apple bars…just means more for me I guess! :)
Thanks for replying!