Zitronen Berliner: German Lemon Donuts
I am addictive to anything Berliner and anything Lemon. Combine the two and I am in heaven dreamland. This German donut features a creamy lemon pudding filling that I know you'll love!
- Prep time
- 25 min
- Cook time
- 20 min
- Yield
- 12 servings
- Difficulty
- HARD
Ingredients
Quantities are shown as originally provided.
- 500 g all-purpose flour (plus more for shaping the berliner)
- 7 grams active-dry yeast (1 pouch)
- 250 ml milk (luke warm)
- 4 egg yolks (size US large. room temperature)
- 80 g granulated sugar
- 60 g butter (room temperature)
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1 lemon (zest only)
- 1/8 tsp salt (a pinch)
- powdered sugar (for topping)
- 1 liter frying oil (I like using safflower oil or peanut oil, but any high heat oil will work)
- 375 ml milk (you could use milk alternatives like almond milk, oat milk or soy milk as well)
- 1 Tbsp all-purpose flour
- 1.5 Tbsp cornstarch
- 40 g granulated sugar
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1 lemon (zest and juice)
- 1/2 Tbsp butter
- 50 g cream cheese
Instructions
- 1
Combine the luke warm milk and yeast and set aside for 5 minutes. It should be bubbly. If not, start over (your milk may have been too hot or too cold). In the bowl of a standmixer, combine all ingredients for the dough and knead for 10 minutes on the medium-low setting. Cover the bowl and allow to rest in a warm spot until doubled in size, about one hour.
- 2
In the meantime, make your lemon pudding. Combine all pudding ingredients except cream cheese in a small saucepan and bring to a boil. Once boiling, whisk on low for one minute and then pour into a bowl to cool down (you can transfer it to the fridge to speed up the cooling down process). To keep a skin from forming on the surface of the pudding, cover it with some plastic wrap. Once cool, whisk in the room temperature cream cheese. The Berliner filling is ready.
- 3
Divide the dough up into equal pieces (best to use a kitchen scale), and using flour-dusted hands, shape each portion into a ball. Allow to rest for another 30 minutes (covered up by a clean linen towel).
- 4
Preheat frying oil (I prefer using avocado oil) to 160°C/320°F and bake in batches (you will want the donuts to be able to swim on the surface) for about 2 ½ minutes on each side or until golden on the outside (flipping using your skimmer or a spotted spoon). They will fry for a total of 5 minutes.
- 5
Fill each Berliner with the lemon pudding from the side, using a decorating bag and filling tip and dust with powdered sugar. I also LOVE filling my Berliner with plum butter! So lecker!