Strawberry Doughnuts with Lemon Glaze

Pin It

Like all Canadians I tend to revel in the warming weather and all that it brings along with it - particularly the abundant growing season. There isn't a whole lot that's more exciting than finding spring's fresh greens that you know will lead to summer's bounty.

And the first berries of the season? Watch out. Food tastes like food again and nothing is sweeter than a bright red, freshly picked, local strawberry. In fact I'm hoping to go strawberry picking this weekend so I can really stock up on this summer staple.

In my mind, the first crop of the season was always going to be just one thing - these strawberry doughnuts, and the lemon glaze was a no brainer to keep it all in balance. And I'm super happy I did! These were nice and cake-y and the strawberries added an awesome burst of flavour in every bite. The glaze was a nice tart/sweet finish.

In the photos you'll notice that the doughnuts look barely glazed, but in fact they were twice submerged with hardening time in between. Next time I make these (and there will definitely be a next time!) I'm going to make a thicker glaze, partly because I like how it looks, and partly because I like the ever so slight crunch on the outside before getting to the cake-like inside.  The flavour is all there, but the visual isn't quite on point for me (I'm picky). Glaze recipe below adjusted accordingly.

Well we should probably just get to what we all came here for, the recipe!

Keep reading for more!

Strawberry Banana Muffins: Tastes of Summer

Pin It

This is not just any muffin. This is a strawberry and banana muffin. It's sweet, charming and a perky little thing.

See that cookbook? Just looking at it, you cen tell it's full of classics, right? This was published the same year I was born, and like all things from that year, this is a great, reliable little book that has seen me through a number of muffin and bread-like adventures. It also has the great bonus feature of a few hand written corrections from my mum, the original owner. I have a few cookbooks in my kitchen that have been around since the beginning of my time and I love checking out the recipes that were "au courant" in the 80's to see how tastes have changed (a lot!).  I also know that when I need to peel something back to the basics, these are the best references a girl can hope for.

Anyway...with ol' faithful there by my side, a hankering to get baking again after my recent trip to France and some strawberries left in the freezer from last picking season that were begging to be used, I got searching and I soon found what I was looking for ... sort of. I came across a recipe for banana date muffins. Admittedly not at all what I was looking for originally, but the description under the title said "A perky little muffin." Obviously I had no choice but to use and adapt this recipe and make it work. And boy did it!