Post Updated: 07.12.23

Persian Love Cake Doughnuts: come fall in love with the dreamiest doughnuts ever!

These romantically named little beauties really do live up to their name: stunning in appearance and a sheer delight taste wise.

Persian Love Cake Doughnuts: The Discovery

I first came across Persian Love Doughnuts in the dreamy party and entertaining book “Celebrate” by the lovely Lauren Conrad and they had me intrigued so much that I decided there and then that these would be my next Valentine’s Day dessert.

Persian Love Cake Doughnuts: The Inspiration

Turns out that these little doughnuts are derived from classic Persian Love Cake, a delicious pistachio and rose water flavored cake.

Add other additional variations to the mix such as cardamoms, saffron etc. and you have what I like to call “Eastern Exoticism” in dessert form. Bliss.

Persian Love Cake Doughnuts: The Recipe

The base recipe for these is by Aimee Twigger of Twigg Studios in which she makes a Persian Love Cake recipe and instead of baking it in a cake pan, pipes it into doughnut molds – genius!

So I adapted the recipe for her Persian Love Cake Doughnuts (which you can find here) very slightly and I am very happy with the results.

The cake part has classic pound cake proportions of equal amounts of butter, sugar and flour that make for a universally pleasing cake.

Persian Love Cake Doughnuts: The Flavours

The combination of pistachios, rose, cardamom and saffron take this simple cake to an entirely different level.

It may sound fanciful but honestly, these ingredients gives these little Persian Love Cake Doughnuts incredible depth and a pleasingly heady scent, both of which, conjure up images of what in my mind, were exotic, far flung places such as Isfahan and Samarkand that I would read about in books as a child.

 

Persian Love Cake Doughnuts: The Adornment

The Lemon Glacé Icing provides a wonderfully tart contrast and helps the toppings stay in place.

The fresh rose petals on top obviously make things more aromatic and I’ve used homegrown roses from my garden to decorate the doughnuts and as “props” for the photos.

The chopped pistachios that these beauties are topped with give a nice extra nuttiness while providing vivid green adornment.

Savour these Persian Love Cake Doughnuts on Valentine’s Day or any other special occasion.

Make them with love and eat them with joy!

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Persian Love Cake Doughnuts

Recipe Type: Dessert    Author: Alice In Eatland

Prep Time: 30 Minutes    Cook Time: 20 Minutes    Total Time: 50 Minutes

Serves: 10 – 12

 

Persian Love Cake Doughnuts: easy recipe for these incredibly delicious, gloriously fragrant and absolutely stunning beauties.

 

INGREDIENTS

 

• 50 grams pistachios
• 1 tbsp warm milk
• A big pinch of saffron strands
• 100 grams flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 6-8 pods green cardamom
• 100 grams salted butter, soft
• 100 grams caster sugar or superfine sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp rose water OR 1/4 tsp rose essence

 

METHOD

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F / 180 degrees C.
2. Butter and flour a 12 hole mini doughnut pan.
3. Grind the pistachios in a coffee grinder or food processor until finely powdered. Set aside.
4. Add the saffron to the warm milk in a small cup and set aside.
5. Combine the flour and baking powder in a bowl.
6. Grind the cardamom pods in a coffee grinder. Sieve.
7. Cream the butter and sugar a few minutes until creamy. Add rose water or rose essence and eggs one at a time alternately with flour mixture.
8. Add remaining flour, powdered pistachios, ground (and sieved) cardamoms and the saffron milk mixture.
9. Put this mixture into a piping bag snipped at the tip or fitted with a plain round nozzle (I used a large Ateco 809 tip) and pipe the batter into the doughnut molds.
10. You may have some leftover batter after filling all the mini doughnut molds. I used mine to bake a few Persian Love Cake Cupcakes!
11. Bake 15 – 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the doughnuts comes out clean.
12. Remove from oven and cool 5 minutes.
13. Loosen the edges with a small knife and invert doughnuts onto a wire rack.
14. Re-invert and cool completely.
15. Trim any edges if necessary to get a neat round shape.

 

To decorate with Lemon Glacé Icing:

1. Stir 100 grams of icing sugar with 1 – 2 tablespoons or more of fresh lemon juice until of pouring consistency.
2. Place a sheet of wax paper or parchment paper on a cookie sheet, tray or flat work surface.
3. Place the cooled doughnuts onto the sheet.
4. Drizzle the Lemon Glacé Icing with a spoon over the doughnuts.
5. Decorate with fresh snipped or chopped rose petals (thoroughly washed and dried) and finely chopped pistachios.