Pizza dough donuts are one of my favorite ways to impress guests while putting forth almost no effort (and even less cash). While I usually just dunk freshly-fried rings of pizza dough in cinnamon-sugar and serve, this time I decided to step it up a bit, frying the dough rings in a combination of fruity olive oil and vegetable oil instead of pure vegetable oil, and dredging them in a sweet/tart/spicy blend of sugar, fresh orange zest and ginger.

Not only scrumptious, they were so gorgeous, they warranted their own Facebook album.

• ingredients
• 1 cup sugar Pantry
• zest of 1 orange, plus a little extra for garnish $1 for 2 oranges
• 1 1” piece ginger, grated 0.50
• 1 recipe pizza dough $1.50
• extra virgin olive oil Pantry
• vegetable oil Pantry

Total Cost of Ingredients $3

Directions

In medium bowl, mix the sugar, orange zest and grated ginger until well-incorporated.

Divide dough into 8 balls. Roll each ball into a 6” snake, and connect the two ends to form a circle.

Pour about 1” of equal parts olive and vegetable oil into a medium pot or deep frying pan. Heat over medium-high heat, until viscous (test by dropping a tiny splash of water into the middle of the oil—it’s ready when it sizzles).

Working in batches, fry the donuts until they are golden-brown on one side. Flip, using a metal slotted spoon or tongs, and cook on the other side until golden-brown.

Transfer the donuts immediately from the hot oil into the sugar-orange-ginger mixture and coat well. Repeat until all donuts are cooked and coated.

To serve, top each donut with a little extra sugar-orange-ginger mixture and a pinch of orange zest.

Makes 8 donuts.