Vanilla-Glazed French Crullers

Homemade French Crullers, made with tender, buttery pâte à choux and dipped in sweet honey glaze, are simple enough for a lazy Sunday morning breakfast but pretty enough for a special occasion brunch. “Crullers” are kind of a broad category of pastry. Traditional Crullers are fried rectangles of dough twisted into a sort of braided torpedo. Sometimes, Crullers are made with a batter more akin to a cake doughnut. But, French Crullers are lovely fluted, ring-shaped doughnuts made from pâte à choux that’s fried and then dipped in a sweet glaze.

Pâte à choux is that awesome, buttery, eggy dough used to make things like Profiteroles and Eclairs. It can be a bit tricky. But, the version used for these French Crullers is easy-peasy. Frying the dough eliminates many of the challenges of baking pâte à choux. The dough comes together quickly – they are quite literally something you can decide to make at 9am and be happily eating by 10am. The doughnuts are best the day they are made, but still pretty good the next day.

Ingredients:

for the doughnuts:

• 1/2 cup + 1 tbsp whole milk
• 1/2 cup + 1 tbsp water
• 8 tbsp (1 stick) butter
• 1 tbsp granulated sugar
• 3/4 tsp table salt, 1 1/4 tsp kosher salt (*See note)
• 1 1/4 cup unbleached, all-purpose flour
• 3 large whole eggs
• 1 large egg white, lightly beaten
• 1-2 tbsp grated lemon zest (about 1 large lemon)

for the glaze:

• 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
• 1 tbsp honey
• 2-3 tbsp milk
• 1 tbsp pure vanilla extract