Happy Valentine’s Day!

If everything goes according to plan, The Frozen Moose yogurt store should be open today (keep your fingers crossed for me!). I wrote this quick post ahead of time in anticipation that I wouldn’t have time to sleep or breathe anything but frozen yogurt but I still wanted to share a festive post. I couldn’t stay away from you all!

Chocolate + Wine sounds romantic, doesn’t it? Continuing on with my love for donut pan, I was set on coming up with a recipe that used wine and chocolate for Valentines’ day. I am not a wine drinker myself but I sure enjoyed this combination in these cake donuts. I tried multiple batches of these vegan donuts for Fork and Beans Valentine’s Day bake-off with many failures (ie. coming out completely flat and gummy).

Although they aren’t perfect, these donuts are moist, chocolately and easy to pull together. They could be a little bit lighter in texture and height (maybe add an egg or use egg replacer for vegan?) but I still enjoyed them very much…what’s not to like when something is covered in chocolate? 🙂

Chocolate Kissed Red Wine Donuts

Ingredients

For donuts
1/4 cup oat flour (millet, brown rice or sorghum could be subbed)
1/4 cup buckwheat flour (millet, brown rice, or sorghum could be subbed)
1/4 cup flax meal
1 Tbsp coconut flour (or could use 2 more Tbsp of oat or buckwheat flour)
3-4 tbsp cacao or cocoa powder
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/3 cup coconut palm sugar or sucanat
1/4 cup Earth balance, or refined coconut oil (no coconut taste), melted (room temp)
1 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup red wine
1/4 cup non-dairy milk (room temperature)

For chocolate glaze
1/2 cup dairy-free dark chocolate bar, chopped or chocolate chips (I used Endangered Species 72% bar)
2 tsp refined coconut oil (no taste) or all-vegetable shortening

Optional toppings
chocolate shavings or cacao nibs
2 Tbsp fruit-sweetened strawberry or raspberry preserves (mixed with 1/2 Tbsp powdered sucanat and slightly thinned with 1 tsp of red wine, only add this prior to serving)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Grease donut pan and set aside.
2. Add all dry ingredients (flours through sugar) into a medium mixing and stir to combine. Add wet ingredients (earth balance/oil through wine) bowl and stir together gently.
3. Spoon batter into prepared donut pan and smooth with spatula or press down gently. Bake donuts at 350 F for about 15-16 minutes (should be moist but also cooked through).
4. Let cool in pan for at least 5 minutes before gently removing.
5. To prepare glaze, add chocolate and oil/shortening in a double broiler, stir often until chocolate is melted. Carefully dip tops of donuts into the melted chocolate, sprinkle/drizzle with other toppings if desired and enjoy!

Makes 6 donuts

*If you don’t have a donut pan, you could still make these in mini cake form. Just use greased ramekins or cupcake/muffin liners – will probably make 4-5 so cooking time will most likely increase by a few minutes.