Sourdough Pumpkin Donuts

These baked sourdough pumpkin donuts are full of delicious pumpkin, warm spices, topped with a streusel crumb topping and drizzled with vanilla powdered sugar. This recipe is a delicious way to use up some of your sourdough discard and makes a lovely fall treat.

As someone who loves and bakes sourdough I never have a shortage of sourdough discard. It always breaks my heart a bit when I have to throw out my discard because I don’t have a plan for using it. One of the fun challenges of baking sourdough is finding new recipes for your sourdough discard. Make sure to save this recipe in your stash of sourdough discard recipes!

Combining pumpkin and sourdough to make these baked sourdough pumpkin donuts was a really fun, and tasty, challenge. Most pumpkin donuts are traditionally rolled in a cinnamon sugar mixture but I decided to change my recipe up a bit and make a streusel crumb topping. Even with the streusel topping these donuts still needed a touch more sweetness so then I decided to make a simple vanilla powdered sugar glaze and drizzle it over the top. Now they were perfect!

Ingredients you will need for sourdough pumpkin donuts:

• 1/2 cup sourdough discard
• 3/4 cup pumpkin puree
• 1/3 cup avocado oil
• 2 eggs
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp salt (I use kosher salt)
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1 1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
• 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar (for glaze)
• 1/8 – 1/4 cup heavy cream or milk (for glaze)
• 1 tsp vanilla (for glaze)
• 1 – 1 1/2 cups of streusel crumb topping (recipe here)

Directions for making the donuts:

• 1.) In a large bowl whisk together the sourdough discard, pumpkin puree, oil, eggs and vanilla until blended.
• 2.) Add the brown sugar and granulated sugar and continue to whisk until blended.
• 3.) In a medium bowl whisk together the flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda and pumpkin pie spice.
• 4.) Gradually add the flour mixture to the wet mixture, whisking until combined. Use a spatula to scrape down the sides of the bowl making sure everything is well incorporated.
• 5.) Cover with plastic wrap and set aside for 30 minutes to an hour. (You can can also slow ferment the batter in the fridge overnight if desired.)
• 6.) Preheat oven to 350°.
• 7.) Scoop the batter into a large ziploc bag or piping back and cut about 3/4 inch piece off the corner. Pipe the batter into a non-stick donut baking pan.

• 8.) Sprinkle some of the streusel crumb topping on the top of each donut.

• 9.) Bake for 10 minutes. Using a metal skewer or wooden toothpick check to see if the donuts are done by inserting the skewer and checking to make sure it comes out clean.
• 10.) Carefully remove the donuts from the pan and let cool on a wire rack.
• 11.) Repeat steps 7 – 10 with the second batch of donuts.
• 11.) While the donuts are cooling prepare the glaze but whisking the powdered sugar, heavy cream or milk and vanilla. Gradually add the heavy cream or milk until you get a nice glaze consistency that can be drizzled off of a spoon over the donuts.
• 12.) Drizzle the cooled donuts with the glaze and enjoy!

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