Cereal milk is a Milkbar classic, made by steeping unsweetened cornflakes into milk, and then straining out said cornflakes so that the milk is more flavorful. You can toast the cornflakes before you steep them into the milk as well, which will add to the flavor slightly! However, one thing I always wanted to figure out what to do with is repurpose that soggy cornflake mush. Usually, we would compost it. However, I felt like that would be such a waste. When you think about it, the soggy cornflakes are comprised of two things – starch and liquid. Both of those things are a necessity in so many baked goods, so I wanted to use that soggy cornflake mixture to make these baked doughnuts out of! As cute as these baked doughnuts are, there were definitely challenges in making this recipe. For starters, you will 1000% need a scale for this one, along with a cheese cloth, of course a mini doughnut pan(at least one, I used three in total for this recipe!), and an icing rack. It was through this baking experience that I learned the hard way that cornflakes actually absorb about 3x their weight on milk. In my first batch, in an attempt to make these 100% gluten-free, I tried using just the soggy cornflakes and no additional starch, and the end result was a disaster – the doughnuts were sunken in, since the batter had an insufficient starch to liquid the ratio, and I know that was the case, since I added xanthan gum as my gluten-substitute. Also, because of how much liquid was in the batter, the sprinkles sank to the bottom of the pan and burned. It was a pain to clean all of that up. Later, when reattempting this recipe, I actually weighed out my cornflakes, and when I added 1.5oz of cornflakes into a cup(16oz) of milk, after straining out the milk, I ended up with 7.5oz of soggy cornflakes. Meaning that half the milk stayed in the cornflakes. After some extra squeezing with my cheesecloth, I was able to get that down to 5oz of soggy cornflakes. And that was when I started out with 2oz of dry cornflakes! So the cereal absorbed more than double their own weight in milk, and that was still after I squeezed out as much liquid as I could! Fortunately, since I knew the ratios of starch to liquid, thanks to my handy scale, I was able to plan accordingly when it came to batch #2.

The first thing was that, no matter how much or little of the soggy cereal I used, I would still need to add another starch, since there was inherently more milk than actual cereal in the soggy cereal itself. So at that point, I threw the attempt of making these gluten-free out the window(for now), and opted to add in more flour, just to even out the ratios. Luckily, since there was so much milk absorbed into the cornflakes to begin with, the only additional wet ingredients I needed were sugar, oil, vanilla, and vinegar. I used vinegar since that would culture the milk absorbed into the cereal, giving a more buttermilk-kind of vibe in the batter itself, and lending to a lighter cake crumb overall. I did keep this recipe egg free, since I was scaling things down pretty dramatically(fun fact, but 12 cupcakes’ worth of batter makes close to 100 mini baked doughnuts), and the thought of citing this recipe as needing half an egg sounded like a pain in the butt, so I figured instead, let’s just go the non-egg route, and rely on the chemical reaction of vinegar and baking soda to bind the cake together, like with my vegan cupcakes. You could actually make this recipe fully vegan by subbing out the regular milk with a plant-based one, fun fact! Since there is no butter or eggs, the only real animal product here is the milk! Luckily, the (much-needed) addition of flour upped the ratio of starch to milk in the soggy cornflakes, and the final product were very light, springy baked doughnuts! With the cereal milk that was strained out the cornflakes, we are mixing that with powdered sugar and vanilla to form a glaze. And the tops of the doughnuts are finished with rainbow sprinkles, just to give these little doughnuts a Milkbar feel to them!

For the cereal milk/soggy cornflakes:
1.5oz toasted cornflakes
1/3 cup milk(you can use a plant-based milk to make this entire recipe vegan!)
a pinch of salt
1 tsp granulated sugar

In a pot, bring everything to a simmer for 10 minutes. Pour the cereal through a cheese cloth, straining out as much milk as possible – expect very little to come out, since I purposely set it up so that the majority of the milk will be absorbed into the cereal, while the cereal milk that can be strained out will be very flavorful for the glaze. Make sure you can weigh out the reserved strained cereal to be at about 5oz. If it is somehow below that weight, add back in a little of the strained cereal milk. If over that, return the cereal to the cheesecloth and continue straining. Reserved the strained liquid, as you will be using that to make the glaze with.

For the batter:
5oz soggy cornflakes
1/3 cup granulated sugar
2 tsps clear vanilla extract
1oz canola oil
.5oz vinegar
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
a pinch of salt
1/3 cup rainbow sprinkles

In a bowl, whisk the cornflakes, sugar, vanilla, oil, and vinegar together until combined and completely smooth – you do not want lumps of cornflake in there. Sift the flour, baking soda, and salt together and toss the sprinkles through that. Fold the flour mixture into the cornflake mixture to form your batter. Transfer to the batter to a piping bag. Line 3 mini doughnut baking tins with cooking spray and pipe your batter into each one. Bake the doughnuts at 375 degrees F for 8 minutes. Allow them to cool slightly before carefully removing them from the tin, using a spoon to help as necessary.

For the glaze:
Cereal milk*
1 1/4 to 1 1/2 cups confectioner’s sugar
2 tsp clear vanilla extract
a pinch of salt

In a bowl, mix everything together. Press cling wrap on top of the surface of the glaze and refrigerate it until time to use.

For garnish:
Rainbow sprinkles

Dip the doughnuts into the glaze, and add the sprinkles on top. Let the doughnuts rest on a glazing rack so that any excess glaze can drip off, and harden slightly.