Bacon Donuts with Chocolate Sauce

Yep,  that's what I said: bacon donuts. You're already drooling, aren'tcha? When I read the recipe I got all crazy giddy, too. I vaguely remembered it from the show, but these were done on an early season, so it had been a while since I'd thought about them. I was originally planning to try a different dessert recipe this week, but with my schedule--for the next few weeks I'm busy every night with an out of town theatre production--it worked out best to do this simple and quick recipe. (It's so quick, in fact, that it won the Quickfire Challenge for which it was created!)

Even though I found this in How To Cook Like a Top Chef, it's also available online! So click here to check it out. You'll notice I used an alternate spelling. Artistic license.

So, anyway, if you wanna see all the details of the dish, just click above. I did two things differently than suggested. I used maple bacon instead of applewood smoked and I used regular granulated sugar instead of superfine. Not sure how much of a difference the bacon made because I couldn't really taste it. And I'm not sure if the sugar grain size made a difference, but after rolling the first three donuts in the coating, I realized a little more sugar is just what they needed.

Speaking of the first three donuts, I should have taken a photo of them in my hand compared to the ones that made it into this photograph because they were way too big. I thought I separated them into heaping tablespoonfuls but I was too generous. After being in the oil for 2 minutes, they still weren't done in the very center and were bordering on burning. I ended up resizing them all to be about the size of a donut hole or a teeny bit bigger than a golf ball.

Enough about the mechanics. In regards to the taste, I gotta say...these donuts didn't really live up to my expectations. The pay-off was the chocolate sauce, in my opinion. Will I make these again? Sure! They were fast, easy and are surely a conversation piece. ("Did you say BACON donuts???") And next time I'll attempt the beer sauce that's in my book and serve that up, too.

Besides the sauce, another good thing about these bacon donuts is that they have inspired me to create my own donut recipe. As soon as I try it, you'll be the first to know!