Sea Salted Maple Pumpkin Doughnuts with a Cinnamon Cream Cheese Filling

Pumpkin Doughnuts, topped with Sea Salted Maple Glaze and filled with my favorite Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting. These doughnuts are chewy, yet soft on the inside. Mild in flavor and only slightly sweet, giving you the freedom to sweeten the toppings and fillings without giving yourself a toothache.

Sea Salted Maple Pumpkin Doughnuts with a Cinnamon Cream Cheese Filling

Yield: 2 dozen+

Ingredients:

1/2 cup warm water
2 packages Red Star Yeast's Platinum
2/3 cup warm whole milk
2 large eggs, beaten
15 oz pumpkin puree
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
6-7 cups Bread Flour
1/4 cup maple syrup
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 tablespoon salt
2 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
*extra flour for rolling
vegetable oil for fryer

For your filling:

8 oz cream cheese
3-4 cups powdered sugar
1-3 tablespoon heavy cream
1 tablespoon Cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt

For your icing:

1/2 cup maple syrup
2 cups powdered sugar
sea salt for sprinkling

Directions:

In a small bowl add yeast and warm water until the yeast has dissolved. About 5 minutes, once it is bubbly or appears foamy it is ready to use.
In the bowl of your electric mixer with your dough hook attachment add in milk, eggs, pumpkin, oil, salt, cinnamon, maple syrup, sugar 2 cups of your flour.
Beat vigorously. Add in remaining flour 1/2 cup at a time until dough is firm enough to kneed. Not too sticky.
Pour dough out onto a floured work surface and kneed for about 6 minutes or until smooth and elastic.
Turn dough into a oiled bowl. Cover in a warm spot and allow to rise until doubles.
On a floured surface roll dough out into a large circle about 3/4 of an inch thick.
Using a 2-3 inch round cookie cutter cut our your donuts. Placing them on a lined cookie sheet to rise again. With the extra dough scraps you can shape ring shaped doughnuts or roll them into balls for "doughnut holes."
Allow doughnuts to double in size again (depending on the yeast you use 10-60 minutes)
Meanwhile heat cooking oil to 365 degrees.
Once the doughnuts have risen, fry 1-3 at a time depending on how large your fryer or pot is. Careful not to over crowed them.
Fry for approximately 2-3 minutes flipping half way through the process to evenly brown. Once they are golden brown remove from oil with and place on paper towels to "drain".
Once all the doughnuts are done, allow to cool and meanwhile prepare filling and icing.
To prepare your filling:With an electric mixer whip cream cheese until light and fluffy. Slowly mix in powdered sugar and cinnamon. If it appears too thick mix in 1 tbs of cream a time to thin it out a tad.
To prepare your icing: Using a whisk. Whisk your maple syrup and powdered sugar together until smooth.
To assemble doughnuts: Cut a small whole straight through the center of each doughnut, going all the way to the back but careful not to cut through the other end.
Fill piping bag with a medium sized tip with the cream cheese frosting. Fill each doughnut with the filling.
Spread maple glaze over the tops of each filled doughnut and sprinkle lightly with sea salt.
If you have left over frosting and icing spread onto fried doughnut scraps as well.