Beignets are easily our favourite Disney Park treat; no visit to Walt Disney World or Disneyland is complete without them! Since we are stuck at home with a closed Canadian border, we’ve made these tasty treats more than a few times in recent months. We love replicating the flavours we have had in the parks and also coming up with new ones! Since it’s October we wanted to give our beignets a Fall twist this time… so we’ve got not one, but TWO recipes for you to get your Disney fix at home!
Our O.G. recipe is a bit different than others in that it doesn’t use shortening… we use butter (because butter always tastes better). We suggest following our original base recipe whenever making beignets! You can find the recipe here.
Apple Cider Beignets
When thinking about Fall flavours, this is one that makes sense to me. At first I thought we should put apples in the dough, but then you’re just really making an apple fritter, not a beignet. Then I remembered that we will often shake the beignets in Kool-Aid crystals, and you can buy apple cider crystal packs. VOILA! We’ve got Apple Cider flavoured beignets.
I don’t usually make the dough, so rather than using our recipe, I used the Disneyland blog recipe. I am in the middle of a kitchen reno, so I thought that I was saving myself time by not Googling another recipe. I’m still not sure if I used the right yeast for the recipe, but they turned out, and that’s what matters. They were good… I didn’t notice a huge difference in the dough if I’m being totally honest. I like the idea of butter better in that I always have it at home, but I’m super glad we tried it! To give these beignets a more “Fall” feeling, I added warming spices. I grabbed the cinnamon, ginger, clove and allspice. Cinnamon you can go pretty heavily on, but watch out for the other three. They only need a dash.
We used a mini cutter instead of the regular one, which you can purchase here. I like to make them with the size you get in the parks for the adults and the smaller one for kids. We use these cutters for so many things; a definite must if you are a Disney baker. Honestly, it was a nice change this time around ’cause we could eat more! I find that I always eat at least three, so having three smaller ones was the better option.
We fried them up (don’t crowd the pot!) in canola oil between 350-375 degrees. Toss them in a bowl with 2 apple cider packs and some icing sugar immediately after frying, then place on a cooling rack and enjoy! We paired the apple cider beignets with caramel sauce. It reminded me of a caramel apple from Main Street! I had some dulce de leche in a jar so that’s what we used, but any caramel sauce will do!
Pumpkin Spice Beignets
You can find pumpkin spice beignets in Disneyland and Club 33 during their Fall season. These copycat Disney beignets are everything you hope they would be. I used our base recipe and added 1 cup of pumpkin puree (Note: puree is different than pumpkin pie filling; it’s not sweetened or seasoned) and 1 heaping teaspoon of pumpkin pie spice. If you don’t have pumpkin pie spice use 2 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp nutmeg, 1/2 tsp allspice, 1/2 tsp ground ginger, and 1/4 tsp cloves.
I made these on a Saturday night, popped them in the fridge and pulled them out Sunday morning to fry up for breakfast. If you haven’t had beignets for breakfast you are missing out! For our classic recipe we roll the freshly fried beignets in powdered sugar and serve right away. Halfway through I decided to throw some pumpkin pie spice in with the icing sugar. I really liked the extra spice, but you can use the plain icing sugar if you prefer. I used the regular sized cutter.
Optional Extras:
Disneyland doesn’t serve their beignets with a dip, but we are huge fans so why not go the extra mile, right? I made a pumpkin cream cheese dip to serve alongside and it took them to the next level. I whipped this up in less than 3 minutes, so it’s definitely worth it in my opinion. Add all the ingredients into a microwaveable bowl and heat for 30 seconds to 1 minute until combined.
Pumpkin Cream Cheese Dip:Â
- 1/4 cup pumpkin puree
- 1 cup cream cheese
- 2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
- 1/4 cup icing sugar
- Pinch of salt
Club 33 serves their pumpkin beignets with a maple glaze instead of powdered sugar. If you would like to try it, melt together 3 tablespoons of butter with a 1/4 cup of pure maple syrup and 1 cup of powdered sugar. Drizzle over the beignets and serve!
Maple Glaze:
- 3 tbsp butter
- 1/4 cup pure maple syrup
- 1 cup powdered sugar
Which Fall Mickey Beignets would you like to try? Let us know in the comments.
For a Christmas Twist, check out our Hot Chocolate Beignets.
Have a magical day!
Erica, Heidi, Elisia and Danielle