Gluten-free Cinnamon Sugar Baked Donuts
Craving donuts since you’ve gone gluten-free? I was too, so I created this recipe for gluten-free cinnamon sugar donuts. This gluten-free donut recipe is so easy and delicious!
Doughnuts are among the top three things I’ve missed the most since having to give up gluten. Really, I only would buy doughnuts at most 3 times a year during my adult life, but still, the idea that I can no longer grab a doughnut with my kids is such a bummer.
I’ve decided that I just need start making my own homemade gluten-free doughnuts! These gluten-free cinnamon sugar doughnuts are the result of trying and tinkering with several recipes until I got them just right. They taste like the doughnut holes I remember, but honestly, I think these are even better!
I made these mini gluten-free doughnuts in my Norpro Nonstick Mini Donut Pan
. 
You know what I learned? I needed to order a 2nd one! Doing one batch of 12 doughnuts at a time took a little too long for my tastes.
Luckily the pans are affordable, so getting two isn’t a big deal. If you have a full sized doughnut pan, feel free to use that instead. The cooking time would likely be just a couple minutes longer. These would also work well in a Babycakes Nonstick Coated Donut Maker
.
Since this was my first time using my doughnut pan, I wasn’t sure what the best technique was for filling the cavities in the pan. I tried scooping it in, but that covered up the hole in the middle, and also made a mess of the pan.
I consulted with my friend Jeanine, the gluten-free doughnut queen, and she suggested placing the batter in a Ziploc bag, cutting off the corner, and squeezing it into each cavity. That worked perfectly!
I used Gluten Free Mama’s Almond Blend All Purpose Gluten-Free Flour
for the flour in this recipe, with excellent results. Other good all-purpose blends would likely work well in this, such as King Arthur Flour Gluten-free Measure for Measure Flour
or gfJules, but I haven’t tested them in this recipe yet. As always, I recommend avoiding gluten-free flour blends with bean flours.
Last week was teacher appreciation week. I have a teacher friend, Angie, at my son’s school that has celiac, so I like to sign up to provide treats that she can eat. I made these doughnuts to send for her and the other gluten-free folks to enjoy at the teacher appreciation breakfast.
I even packaged them up in a doughnut box. She loved them and asked for this gluten-free donut recipe, so I knew they were a hit with more than just my family.
I think you’ll enjoy them too! Be sure to try my recipe for gluten-free maple donuts too! They’re equally delicious and a favorite treat of mine. My kids love both of these doughnuts and beg me to make them more often!
Recipe adapted from King Arthur Flour.
I also have an entire Pinterest board full of gluten-free donut recipes you can check out! I’ve pinned so many more gluten-free donut recipes that I’m wanting to try too!
If you make these and love them, please come back and give this recipe a 5 star rating in the recipe card! Feel free to comment with tips or to share any successful substitutions you made.
Gluten-free Cinnamon Sugar Donut recipe:
Gluten-free Cinnamon Sugar Donuts
This cinnamon sugar gluten-free donut recipe is so easy and delicious! Not only are these super easy to make and delicious, but they were just as great on day 2. So feel free to bake them up the day before you need them.
Ingredients
Doughnuts:
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1/4 cup vegetable, corn or canola oil
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1/3 cup brown sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1 1/2 tsp. vanilla
- 11 1/4 oz. (about 2 2/3 cups) all-purpose gluten-free flour
- 1/2 tsp. xanthan gum*
- 2 tsp. ground cinnamon
- 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
- 3/4 tsp. to 1 tsp. ground nutmeg
- 3/4 tsp. salt
- 1/4 tsp. baking soda
- 1 cup milk
Topping:
- 5 Tablespoons salted butter, melted
- 1 1/2 Tablespoons cinnamon
- 1/2 cup sugar
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425°. Spray mini doughnut pan with non-stick cooking oil spray.
- In the bowl of your electric mixer, cream together the butter, oil, and sugars until smooth.
- Add the eggs and vanilla, beating until smooth.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, xanthan gum, cinnamon, baking powder, nutmeg, salt, and baking soda.
- Alternate adding the flour mixture and the milk to the butter mixture, beginning and ending with the flour. Mix on low just until everything is thoroughly combined.
- Scoop the batter into a gallon-size Ziploc bag and seal tightly. Use scissors to snip off a bottom corner. Squeeze the batter out of the opening into the cavities of the doughnut pan, filling until almost flush with the top of the cavities.
- Bake at 425° for 7 minutes or until they are a pale, golden brown, and a toothpick inserted in a doughnut comes out clean.
- Remove from the oven and let cool in the pan for 2-3 minutes. Turn the pan over to turn doughnuts out onto a cooling rack.
- Repeat with remaining batter, spraying pan again with cooking spray between batches. Makes 4 dozen.
- While doughnuts are cooling, make the topping.
Topping:
- Melt the butter in a small bowl.
- In another small bowl, whisk together the cinnamon and sugar.
- Take each cooled doughnut, dunk the top half in the butter, then in the cinnamon-sugar mixture to coat. Place on rack or tray to set. Enjoy!
- These can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for 2-3 days.
Notes
*If the gluten-free flour blend you use already has xanthan gum or guar gum in it, then omit the xanthan gum called for in this recipe.
*Tip: After you dip a dozen or so of the doughnuts into the cinnamon sugar mixture, the mixture starts to get clumpy. If you care about that, I recommend only putting a small amount of your cinnamon sugar mixture in your dipping bowl, keeping the rest reserved. Once your mixture gets clumpy, dump it out and refill from the reserved mixture. Hope that makes sense! Let me know if you have questions!
*A little note about the nutmeg in this recipe. I put a range that you can choose. The first time I made these, I used a full teaspoon, and it was perfect. However I was using an older nutmeg container. Shortly after, I bought a new container of nutmeg and used that the second time I made these. I felt the nutmeg was a little overpowering in that batch. So feel free to adapt based on how much you like nutmeg and how new your spices are.
I hope you and your family enjoy these gluten-free doughnuts too!
Please come back and rate and review these gluten-free donuts after you try them!
I made these tonight for my family, everyone loved them! Half the batch I tossed in powder sugar (made these for 3 kids ages 2-5) the other half I made the batter chocolate and again tossed in powder sugar. Even my husband loved them and he is not a donut fan. Thank you for the recipe!
I made these in mini muffin pans and they turned out more like donut holes. I do not have a donut pan but will be purchasing one soon. I have a feeling these will be a regular along with my other donuts made for fast treats.
These doughnuts were incredible! I dipped them in melted semi sweet chocolate and placed them in the fridge for 20 minutes. My husband raved about how great they tasted. He said it reminded him of the hostess mini chocolate doughnuts. I used Bob’s Red Mill 1 to 1 baking flour. I will be purchasing a larger size doughnut pan and baking these again. Thanks for such a great recipe!
Made these with my daughter…they were awesome!!! I will definitely make these again!!
These are great! I used Cloud 9 Cup For Cup flour and skipped the Xantham gum. They are light, fluffy, and tastey! They are also surprisingly easy (I have never made donuts before). I halved the recipe and baked 6 large donuts for 10 minutes.
Brittane,
Thanks for letting me now that flour worked well in these! So glad you found them easy and tasty!! Thanks so much for your comment! ~Michelle
These were wonderful!! I have so missed eating a cake like doughnut since going GF. Instead of the sugar coating I added a powder sugar icing…yummy!!
So glad you could enjoy these, Jennifer! I bet the icing was just perfect on them!
I just made these today and they are fantastic!!! My entire family devoured them! Thanks for a great recipe 🙂
Yay! So glad to hear that! Hope you’ll enjoy them many times in the future!
If you use an olive oil spread in place of butter and soy or almond milk for the recipe the’re lactose free
Since going gluten free, I began to miss some of the treats. I just made these, and have scarfed two of them down already! Thank you so much for this wonderful recipe, which I will be saving in my recipe book. I substituted the milk for almond’s milk, and instead of the butter for the butter with cinnamon & sugar mix topping, I used Spectrum organic vegetable shortening. Also, I used Better Batter flour, which I measured in ounces instead of cups. I baked them in a full size donut pan (6 donuts per pan, so I bought two pans), which yielded 15 full size donuts. I cannot thank you enough!
Sara,
I’m so glad you tried these! Thanks so much for including your successful substitutions! Those are super helpful. I hope you enjoy them again soon!
These were super good! I used almond milk and coconut oil. I also used turbinado sugar for the sugar and coconut sugar for the brown sugar.
Elisabeth,
Thanks for letting us all know about your successful substitutions! I’m so glad that those worked well!
I made these this morning with regular flour ( we are not gluten free) and they were AMAZING! I am sure the GF version is just as good. We have donuts every Sunday morning and I have been searching for a really good baked donut. I can stop looking!!! I’m hoping to be able to tweak them into a chocolate flavor as well 🙂 Thanks so much!
Jamie, thanks so much for your comment! I’m so glad to have ended your donut search! 🙂
Promise me that you’ll come back and let me know if you tweak these into a chocolate version! It’ll be a while before I have time to play with that, so I’d love to hear what works or doesn’t work for you.
Thanks again for coming back to rate and comment!
I need dairy free. Can I substitute the milk?
Kimberly,
I think that a milk alternative like almond milk or coconut milk would totally work in this recipe. If you try it, please come back and let me know!
Mmm! I’m thinking donut holes. 😉
Andy,
I made some of these in a mini muffin pan and they totally were like donut holes!!
Can these freeze? I would love to make for friend but would have to freeze some
Lisa,
I haven’t tried freezing these, but I do believe they would freeze well. They are very similar to muffins and I freeze muffins all the time. I think your friend will love them!
I know this comment is ancient, but in case anyone else is looking for advice, these froze beautifully for me!
Very nice to see a gluten-free doughnut recipe that holds over till the next day! My sense is that’s a bit of an issue usually. These look so good and I love the miniature size. I’m glad your teacher friend appreciated your appreciation gift. Way better than Dunkin Donuts (or the classic apple)!
I always love your comments Molly! I can tell that you actually read my posts! lol
I’d love to share some with you sometime! If only we lived closer!
Of course I read! (Even if it’s tempting to focus on the beautiful pictures!) Hopefully we’ll be able to meet sometime, even if not to share doughnuts. Are you going to FABlogCon this year?
Just made these and they are very, very good. I bought a donut pan to make it really real. I have celiac disease and this is such a blessing.
I’m glad you made these and enjoyed them! I bet you’ll put that doughnut pan to good use! Thanks so much for your comment!
Kristen,
I think your hubby would love these! And yes, good justification for buying a doughnut pan! I hope you enjoy! Thanks for stopping by to comment!
Yeah! I am so glad you put this recipe on your website! These are the best doughnuts hands down! I am going to make a batch tomorrow before church. I have the regular size doughnut pan so I will let you know how they turn out.
P.S. Thank you Michelle for remembering me for teacher appreciation, you are such a dear friend!
Thanks so much Michelle!
I’m so glad you ended up making them Angie! Let me know if you do some other variations.
Can these be made egg free? My grandkids are gluten, egg & dairy free.
Kathy,
It would be easy to make these dairy-free, just replace the butter called for with more oil, and use melted margarine or shortening for helping make the topping stick. I’m not 100% on the egg-free substitution, but I’d give it a try with the flaxseed/water egg replacement trick. Please do come back and comment if you give it a try so others will know how it (or another substitution) worked!
I used the egg replacement that you mentioned and they came out delicious. I also had to replace the baking powder because my son can’t have corn and I didn’t have any at the moment. I just replaced it with more baking soda and vinegar and it worked just fine. Even my kids who aren’t gluten free and my husband enjoyed them.
How much baking soda and vinegar did you use?
What about using coconut oil. We can’t use vegetable, corn or canola? Also could use almond or coconut milk I assume
You can also use groung foaxseed, as an egg replacement.
Try organic egg they are proccesed completley different so an intolorence or allergy to egg is not always the same with organic????
This makes a great coffee cake, too. I put the whole batch in a cinnamon sugar coated bundt pan and baked at 375 for 40 min. Let cool in pan for about 10 min. Remove from pan and spray with butter flavored cooking spray and sprinkle more cinnamon sugar over it. Delicious.
Fabulous idea! Thank you.
My dough is thick…is this normal!
The dough is delicious ?
Oh these look sooo good, Michelle!!! So happy that you gifted your friends with these delicious donuts. I bet she was beyond thrilled! I would be. 🙂
Shirley
Thanks so much Shirley! You can bet I’d be sharing some with you if you lived nearby! 🙂
These doughnuts look AMAZING Michelle! Those are some lucky teachers at your kid’s school! Thanks so much for the shout-out, glad I could help. 🙂
Thanks Jeanine! Who knows how many batches I’d have messed up if you hadn’t shared that simple tip with me! It was one of those, “Why didn’t I think of that?!” moments for sure!