Sourdough Peach Fritters

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These Sourdough Peach Fritters are everything you want in a summer donut. A twist on my viral Sourdough Apple Fritters, they have crispy golden edges, soft fluffy centers, and juicy peaches packed into each bite. A tangzhong makes the dough extra pillowy before the fritters are fried and dipped in a sweet glaze that melts into every craggy edge. If you have fresh peaches, this is a recipe you need to make.

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 the peach filling.
8. Spatula– to spread peach 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.

Gather Your Ingredients:

1. Sourdough starter- recently fed and refreshed to use to feed the sweet levain.
2. Whole milk– milk enriches this dough making it soft and tender. You’ll also use milk to make your tangzhong and thin the glaze.
3. Egg and egg yolk– adds tenderness and structure to the dough working as a binder.
4. Unsalted butter– enriches dough and adds rich flavor to glaze.
5. White Sugar – sweetens the dough and cuts the tang of the starter with a sweet levain. Sweetens the peach filling.
6. Brown Sugar- helps caramelize filling and give that peach pie flavor.
7. Sea salt– balances sweet and sour flavors.
8. Vanilla extract– for aromatic warmth and depth of flavor to dough, filling, and glaze.
9. 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.
10. Peaches- I recommend using peaches that are firmer and less ripe. Softer, riper peaches will release more water and make the filling wet and will be harder to handle when shaping the fritters.
11. Cornstarch- this is very important to thickening the filling to avoid a wet and sticky dough.
12. Lemon juice- keeps peaches fresh and balances the sweetness.
13. Cinnamon, Nutmeg, and Cardamom- brings cozy warm spices to the fritters to balance the sweet peaches.
14. Heavy Cream- helps create a rich caramelize filling. Also used in the glaze for a thick creamy glaze.
15. Organic Coconut Oil- for frying donuts and achieving a crisp texture without a strong aftertaste. I highly recommend Carrington Organic coconut oil linked here. 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.
16. Powdered sugar– also known as confectioners sugar, to sweeten and thicken vanilla glaze. Do not use granulated sugar as it wont dissolve properly.

Instructions

Step 1: Make the Sweet Levain (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

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

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

Stand mixer instructions: perform one set of stretch and folds after 30 minutes to strengthen your dough.

Hand kneading instructions: 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.

How to perform a stretch and fold: Starting at the edge of the dough with lightly wet hands, gently lift one edge of the dough, stretch it up, and fold it over the center. Rotate the bowl or container 90 degrees and repeat with the next side. Do this for all four sides of the dough to form a ball.

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 Peach Filling

Gather your peaches, and wash and peel the skins if desired. Chop your peaches into roughly 1/4 inch cubes. You don’t want these peach pieces too small or you won’t taste them, but you also don’t want them too large or they won’t mix properly. The key is even chunks.

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

Heat the butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. When the butter has melted, add the peach filling to the pan. Keep the peaches at medium heat, stirring constantly to avoid the bottom burning.

Cook the peach filling about 5-8 minutes, you want the peaches to be tender when you stick a fork in the center but still have some firmness. Depending on the ripeness of the peaches, this time may vary.

Remove from heat when done and transfer to a bowl for cooling. This mixture needs to be fully cooled before you proceed to shaping the fritters.

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 Peach 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 peach 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 peach filling to make sure that the fritters can hold together. On top of the peach 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 peach filling is really well marbled and mixed in. 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. If it’s sticky, add more flour.

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 peach 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. The concern isn’t over flouring, it’s not using enough.

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 120-125 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 7: Fry the Peach Fritters

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 345-350°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 the fritters.

When oil is ready, transfer 2 donuts with parchment paper into oil (you can remove paper with tongs when it separates). Avoid over crowding the pot or you may have difficulty getting the donuts cooked.

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 8: 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 fritters in the glaze.

Step 9: 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 Peach 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

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

Sourdough Donut Recipes:

• Sourdough Apple Fritters
• Sourdough Boston Cream Donuts
• Sourdough Apple Cider Donuts