Cinnamon Sugar Dairy Free Donuts - Dairy Free for Baby (2024)

Ready for the ultimate sweet treat? Whip up a batch of these cinnamon sugar dairy free donuts! These donuts are made with just six simple ingredients, and are perfect for a special breakfast on holiday mornings. They’re rich, they’re sweet, and when you eat them warm out of the oven? Straight up heavenly.

Note: This post was first published in 2019 and has been updated with additional context and photos in 2023. The recipe remains the same.

Ingredients

I’m telling you, these couldn’t be any easier to make! You only need 6 ingredients, and I’m betting you probably have most in your kitchen already.

Here’s what you’ll need for the donut base:

And then here’s what you’ll need for the donut topping. Note that there’s nothing new in this photo; all the same ingredients are used in the base:

Here are some selected ingredient notes:

• Dairy-free butter – I’ve made these with both Earth Balance (the red tub is soy-free as well as dairy-free at the time of publish) and Country Crock plant butter sticks with avocado oil (note these now contain soy). Both those options work quite well. Note that there are many products entering the market these days, and some do not translate as well for baking, so I recommend sticking with one of these options if you’re not confident about the properties of the other products.

• Vanilla almond milk – You can use another milk alternative if you prefer. If it’s a plain version, I recommend adding a quarter teaspoon of vanilla extract to the recipe as well.

Instructions

You’ll find the full recipe amounts and instructions in the recipe card at the bottom of this post, but here’s a helpful overview with process photos. Luckily, this recipe is super simple to make!

Start by combining the flour, sugar, baking powder, and cinnamon in a bowl. *Important* – be sure to spoon and level your flour! If you pack the flour into the cup, the batter can come out too dry.

Pour in the melted butter and almond milk.

The batter will be thick but should be easy to spoon in the donut pan. If the batter looks too thick or dry, add another splash or two of almond milk.

Pour the batter in a greased donut pan.

Then pop it in the oven for about 12 minutes or so at 375 degrees F.

Once they’re done, you’ll melt some additional Earth Balance spread in one bowl, and mix cinnamon sugar in another. Dip the donuts in the melted dairy-free butter…

…Then dip the donuts into the cinnamon sugar mixture.

Helpful Hints for Making These Donuts

A few things that may be helpful for you to know:

• You can make these in a normal donut pan or in a mini donut pan. I prefer regular size ones. If you’re baking them in a mini donut pan, you may need to adjust the cooking time.

• These donuts can be a bit crumbly. I don’t think it’s a bad thing, because they taste insanely good, haha. 😉 If it bothers you, one way to avoid this is to use just slightly less donut batter in your pan. When the batter is too full, the donut is pretty large when cooked – and it can make it harder for the donut to hold it’s weight when you pick it up to eat it. I generally just hold mine in a paper towel while eating it so if it breaks, no big deal.

• It’s normal for the donut to be a bit lighter on the top compared to the side that was in the pan. I put mine towards the top of my oven which seems to help a bit with browning. But “donut stress” (bad-dum-dum) if they’re a little different color on the top and bottom.

• Spoon and level your flour! I can’t stress this enough. If you pack the flour into the cup, it ends up being too much flour and the batter can become dry. That said, this is fixable by adding an extra splash or two of almond milk if it happens.

Allergens in This Recipe

As written, these donuts are dairy free and egg free.

These donuts may contain soy depending on your choice of dairy-free butter. You can make them soy free free by using a soy-free variety of Earth Balance.

These donuts do contain wheat/gluten (in the all purpose flour) and tree nuts (in the vanilla almond milk). I haven’t tried making these with a gluten-free all purpose blend, but it’d certainly be worth a try if you need to watch out for that.

If you can’t have tree nuts, the almond milk would be easy to substitute – you can use whatever other milk alternative fits your needs, like oat milk or rice milk.

More Dairy Free Treats

If you’re looking for more tasty dairy free treats, try one of these recipes:

• Dairy free sugar cookie bars
• Chocolate dairy free cupcakes with peanut butter frosting
• Dairy free gingerbread cookies
• Dairy free bread pudding

I hope you love these cinnamon sugar dairy free donuts as much as I do! If you try ‘em, be sure to leave a recipe rating and let me know your thoughts in the comments.

Share with me: What’s your favorite kind of donut? Did you try these dairy free donuts – and if so, what’d ya think?

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