Bread Ahead Doughnut Workshop
Wednesday, 30 June 2021
Bread Ahead are, hands down, my favourite doughnuts. Their raspberry jam filled ones are simple but just done perfectly. I never leave the market without one, so upon discovering that they have their very own cookery school behind the stand, I promptly booked a couple of spots in their doughnut making class.

We arrived at 10 am for the 2 hour class and along with 12 others, we were checked in and ushered to our own tables. In the interest of social distancing, they had pre weighed and distributing the ingredients and of course there was mask wearing throughout, although the kitchen was pretty cool so it wasn't too bad.
Initially I was a little sad because we were given a ready made ball of dough but as it turns out, a good doughnut, like Rome, isn't built in a day. The dough needs to rest overnight so we used the original ball to make our doughnuts in the class - dividing it up, rolling to shape and proving - and then we made our own fresh dough which we took home to have a play with later on.
We also learnt how to make jam from scratch which is something I'm very excited to try at home - super simple and just as good as store bought which can't usually be said for anything I make in the kitchen. The second filling was a thick vanilla custard which was much less exciting and not very special at all so we quickly forgot all about that.
Once our dough balls were proved, it was time to drop them into the deep fat fryer, allowing them to achieve the all important ring of truth (that's the light ring around the middle.) Since the dough floats to the top of the hot oil, the middle doesn't get a chance to fry and instead, is steamed which leaves it super soft. This makes it the perfect place to pipe the filling into.