Sourdough Apple Fritter Donuts

Pillowy Soft. Cinnamon. That bite of apple. Crisp. Dipped in sweet glaze. This is what I wanted in the perfect Sourdough Apple Fritter Donuts, and after several attempts (and a few flops) – this recipe was born. This donut is made completely from sourdough, has plenty of that juicy apple cinnamon filling, and that melt in your mouth glaze for the perfect bite.

While creating this recipe I went down the rabbit hole- scouring old YouTube videos, reading vintage donut shop recipes, and watching the way traditional bakers shaped their fritters. It turns out the secret isn’t just the dough or the apples… it’s the technique of layering, binding with flour, and frying until golden. This recipe brings all of that together in a simple to understand way so you can make donut shop worthy apple fritters.

Why Use a Sweet Levain?

Milder flavor. The added sugar in the levain feeds the yeast while tempering the sourness of the sourdough. The sugar works to stabilize fermentation and works beautifully in enriched doughs.

Why Use a Tangzhong?

Tangzhong is a simple process of heating up milk with flour and creating a roux. Done in minutes, this process pre-gelatinizes the starches allowing the dough to hold more moisture. This process locks in moisture while also strengthening the dough, resulting in pillowy soft texture with an expanded shelf-life. This will give you yeasted results while keeping it sourdough!

Tools You’ll Need:

1. Stand mixer (optional)- for kneading dough. You can also mix by hand but a mixer is easiest.
2. Small and medium sized pot- for making tangzhong and glaze.
3. Kitchen scale or measuring cups and spoons– for measuring ingredients.
4. Rolling pin- for rolling out donuts.
5. Long ruler or tape measure (optional)- for measuring length and width of dough.
6. Bench Scraper or Knife- to cut up the fritter chunks.
7. Large Saucepan- to cook apple filling.
8. Spatula– to spread apple filling.
9. 15 4×4 parchment squares- This make frying the donuts so easy! You can either cut your own squares or buy them, I’ve linked pre-cut squares here.
10. Deep pot or Dutch oven– for frying donuts.
11. Frying thermometer– for keeping oil at 340–350°F. I strongly recommend using this tool to avoid burning I use this one linked here and love it.
12. Slotted spoon or spider- to flip donuts. The spider I use is linked here.
13. Chopsticks (optional)- helpful for flipping donuts. I like these reusable chopsticks linked here.
14. Cooling rack + paper towels– for drying donuts after frying.
15. Tongs- for removing parchment from oil while frying.
16. Digital Thermometer (optional)- helps with assessing when tangzhong is done.
17. Wire rack– for draining excess glaze from donuts after glazing.

*As an amazon affiliate, this post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission for qualifying purchases. I only recommend products that I personally love and use.*

Gather Your Ingredients:

1. Whole milk – milk enriches this dough making it soft and tender. You’ll also use milk to make your tangzhong.
2. Egg and egg yolk– adds tenderness and structure to the dough working as a binder.
3. Unsalted butter – enriches dough and adds rich flavor to glaze.
4. White Sugar – sweetens the dough and cuts the tang of the starter with a sweet levain. Sweetens the apple filling.
5. Brown Sugar- helps caramelize apple filling and give that apple pie flavor.
6. Sea salt – balances sweet and sour flavors.
7. Vanilla extract – for aromatic warmth and depth of flavor to dough, filling, and glaze.
8. All-purpose flour– I recommend AP flour over bread flour to create a more tender crumb. The egg and tangzhong will provide the structure in this recipe making bread flour unnecessary, but you can substitute for bread flour if needed.
9. Apples- I recommend using Granny Smith, they’re tart and very sturdy for baking.
10. Lemon juice- keeps apples fresh and balances the sweetness.
11. Cinnamon and Nutmeg- brings cozy warm spices to the fritters to balance the tart apples.
12. Heavy Cream- helps create a rich caramelize filling. Also used in the glaze for a thick creamy glaze.
13. Organic Coconut Oil- for frying donuts and achieving a crisp texture without a strong aftertaste. I highly recommend Carrington Organic coconut oil linked here. This container lasts me several batches when frying, and you just allow the oil to cool after frying and remove any excess bits before transferring left over oil to a glass jar. Coconut oil has a higher smoke point which is ideal for frying, has little to no aftertaste, and is more stable under high heat making it less likely to oxidize and form harmful free radicals.
14. Powdered sugar – also known as confectioners sugar, to sweeten and thicken vanilla glaze. Do not use granulated sugar as it wont dissolve properly.

Now let’s make Sourdough Apple Fritter Donuts!

Instructions

Step 1: Make the Sweet Levain (Night Before)

Baker’s Schedule: 8:00 PM- Night Before

To start your dough, you’ll want to mix a sweet levain the night before. If this sounds intimidating, it’s not! It’s literally just adding sugar to your starter. This curbs the tang of the sourdough for the perfect donut.

In a clean jar, mix your mother starter with the flour, water, and sugar. Give it a good stir, and allow it to rest at room temperature (optimally 73-75 degrees F). I like to mark the volume in my jar with a rubber band so it’s easy to asses the rise the next morning. When the sweet levain has doubled in size, it’s time to mix your donut dough.

Step 2: Make the Tangzhong

Baker’s Schedule: 8:00 AM- Day 1

Before you get started on mixing your dough, you’ll make your tangzhong. Whisk milk and flour together in a small saucepan.

Cook the tangzhong over medium/low heat, stirring constantly, until it thickens into a paste that is similar to pudding (about 2–3 minutes). For precision, use your digital thermometer and heat to 148-155 F. Do not overheat, or your mixture will be too thick.

Scrape into a bowl immediately to prevent further cooking, cover, and let cool to room temperature before adding to your dough.

Prepare your dough while tangzhong cools.

Step 3: Mix the Dough

Baker’s Schedule: 8:30 AM- Day 1

In a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook or large mixing bowl, add the whole milk, sweet levain, egg and egg yolk, sugar, vanilla, and all of the tangzhong. Whisk ingredients together quickly, it’s okay if it’s lumpy.

Add your flour and salt into your wet ingredients.

Mix on low until a shaggy dough forms, about 2-3 minutes. Scrape down bowl if needed. If using your hands, knead until you work dough together. This is a higher hydration dough, so be aware it will be sticky.

Once the dough has come together add softened butter, a tablespoon at a time mixing each tablespoon in until adding the next. Use a dough scraper to scrape the edges of the bowl to make sure everything is getting mixed in.

Continue mixing on medium-low (speed 2–3) for 8–10 minutes, until dough is smooth, elastic, and tacky but not sticky. If mixing by hand knead dough until butter has fully incorporated and dough is smooth and tacky.

Mixing Notes: If kneading in a mixer or if dough is very wet when mixing by hand, add an additional 25 grams (3 Tablespoons) of flour and mix into dough. Make sure to work flour in completely and assess if you need more flour. I did this twice adding in a total of 50 grams (6 Tablespoons) of flour for the dough consistency I liked.

Do not add more than 50 grams of flour at this stage, or you will lose the high hydration of the dough and end up with a dense donut. If using a stand mixer, dough can become more warm and sticky and I have found kneading dough with my hand (perform a set of stretch and folds) for a minute after mixing in my stand mixer really helps bring the dough together.

Step 4: Bulk Fermentation

If you used a stand mixer, perform one set of stretch and folds after 30 minutes to strengthen your dough. If you mixed dough by hand, perform 3 sets of stretch and folds at 30 minute intervals at the beginning of bulk fermentation. After stretch and folds are completed, cover dough and allow to continue proofing.

Let dough rise at 75–80°F until doubled in size, this takes about 5–6 hours. If your house is very cold, you can put dough in the oven with the light on for a warmer atmosphere. This proofing time is a general guide, this process may take longer the key is to assess when the dough has nearly doubled that’s when it’s ready.

Overnight Fermentation: Once dough has finished rising, you can cover and transfer to the refrigerator overnight for a longer ferment or you can skip this step and go straight to making your fritters. I do find it to be easier to shape the donuts when the dough has been refrigerated but it isn’t necessary.

Step 5: Make the Apple Filling

Baker’s Schedule- 8:00 AM Day 2 (if doing overnight ferment)

Gather your apples, and wash and peel them. Chop your apples into roughly 1/2 inch cubes. You don’t want these apple chunks too small or you won’t taste them, but you also don’t want them too large or they won’t cook properly. The key is even chunks as pictured below.

Toss your apples into a bowl, and add your lemon juice, white sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt, flour, vanilla, and cream. Toss your apples in this to thoroughly coat them.

Heat the butter in a marge saucepan over medium heat. When the butter has melted, add the apple filling to the pan. Cook the apple filling over medium heat, stirring constantly to avoid the bottom burning.

Cook the apple filling about 10 minutes, you want the apples to be tender when you stick a fork in the center but still have some firmness.

Remove from heat when done and transfer to a bowl for cooling.

Easy Preparation Note: You can make this filling ahead if you’d like and refrigerate it until you’re ready to shape and fry the fritters.

Step 6: Shape the Apple Fritters

If you refrigerated the dough overnight, remove from the frig and allow to rest at room temperature for about 30 minutes to take the chill off.

When dough is ready, flour a surface well and dump the dough onto the work area.

Roll your dough out to a 14 inch by 14 inch square. This doesn’t have to be perfectly accurate, but if you’d like you can use a tape measure or ruler to make sure you’re on the right track.

Spread your apple filling over the surface of your dough evenly.

This next step is very important- we are going to add a binder of flour on top of the apples to make sure that the fritters can hold together. On top of the apple filling sprinkle your layer of flour and cinnamon.

Starting at the side of the dough square, roll up the dough like you would a cinnamon roll.

Once you’ve rolled up your dough, you’re going to use a sharp knife or bench knife to cut diagonally up and down the roll opposite directions to create a crisscross of dough cubes. You can cut up any large chunks with your knife as well to make sure the apple filling is really well marbled. This doesn’t need to be pretty!

The next step may seem counterintuitive to the work we just did, but bear with me! Flour the top and sides of the dough chunks WELL, and start to work the dough back together to from a log or loaf.

I can’t stress the importance here of flouring everything with every step. This flour is essential to making the fritters work, so don’t be shy. This flour will absorb the moisture from the apple filling and help the dough chunks stick back together so the fritters don’t fall apart when you fry them.

You can gently knead, pat, shape this loaf back together using flour as you go to help.

Now it’s time to shape your fritters! Use a bench knife to cut sections off of the dough log. I measured my fritters out, and each weighed roughly 120-130 g and this made 15 fritters. Be aware that if you make these too large, you may struggle to flip them during frying, and they may be raw in the center. The sweet spot for me was 120g fritters.

To form your fritter, flour a surface well and flour a 4×4 square of parchment. Press your fritter together (think hamburger patty), gently flipping and pressing the other side as well to form a circle. Transfer the shaped fritter to the floured square of parchment, and place on a baking sheet for proofing.

Repeat this shaping step with the remaining dough until all of your fritters are shaped and lined on baking sheets to proof.

Cover your pans with plastic wrap and allow fritters to proof at room temperature 1 to 1 1/2 hours.

Step 6: Fry the Apple Fritters

Baker’s Schedule- 11:00 AM Day 2

Line a cooling rack with paper towels. Fit your candy thermometer into your deep pot. Transfer 3–4 cups of organic coconut oil to a deep pot or Dutch oven, and heat to 350-360°F on medium heat. If oil gets hotter than this, reduce heat accordingly. Watch your temperatures very closely and adjust your heat as needed to avoid burning apple fritters.

When oil is ready, transfer 2 donuts with parchment paper into oil (you can remove paper with tongs when it separates).

Fry 30 seconds at a time per side, flipping fritters gently using chopsticks or a slotted spoon. I repeat this step a few times rotating fritters to avoid burning. Remove after 2-3 minutes with a slotted spoon or spider spoon and donuts are a golden brown. Transfer fritters to a rack lined with paper towels to cool.

Repeat until all your fritters have been fried. Allow to cool while you prepare the glaze.

Step 7: Make the vanilla Glaze

Melt the butter for your glaze in a medium sized pot over low heat.

When the butter has melted, add the powdered sugar and cream. Whisk until the powdered sugar has completely dissolved, making sure to keep this on LOW heat.

Remove from heat immediately after sugar has dissolved, and whisk in the vanilla and salt.

If the glaze is too thick, thin with a couple tablespoons of milk at a time until it reaches the desired thickness.

Be aware that if you overheat the glaze, it will be more thin. I try to heat it just to the point that it needs just a minute to cool and then I can comfortably dip the apple fritters in the glaze.

Step 8: Glaze the Donuts

Dip cooled donuts face-down into glaze. Flip to the other side and coat. Remove from glaze and let excess drip off, then transfer back to an unlined wire rack. After donuts have cooled for roughly ten minutes, dip both sides again to coat with more glaze if desired.

Let glaze set for 30 minutes before serving.

And the last thing to do is brew a fresh cup of coffee to enjoy with your warm glazed Sourdough Apple Fritter Donuts!

Yields 15 fritters (120g)

How to Store:

Room Temperature- Keep fritters in an airtight container at room temp up to 2 days. But in my opinion, these are best enjoyed fresh!

FAQ’S:

Do I have to use a sweet levain or can I use my regular starter?

You can use your regular starter as long as it’s fed, but be aware the result may be more tangy and sour.

Can I make these without an overnight proof?

Yes! Let the dough rise 6 hours at room temp till doubled then continue with shaping.

Why do my fritters fall apart when frying?

You likely skipped or skimped on the flour binder. Flour is the glue of this recipe, it keeps the apples tucked into the dough and holds them together.

Can I bake these instead of frying?

They won’t have the same crisp texture. Frying is traditional and gives the best flavor and look.

If you loved this recipe, drop a comment and leave a star review and don’t forget to checkout more of my yummy sourdough donut recipes!

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