With Pokemon Day coming up, I wanted to celebrate with my second of three Pokemon Legends: Z-A-inspired Pokemon doughnuts! In the case of this recipe, we are going with the Omega Old Fashioned Donut, inspired by Groudon, the Continent Pokemon, from Pokemon Ruby and Pokemon Omega Ruby. Groudon is a giant red dinosaur-looking creature, said to have raised the land from the sea. It can summon intense sunlight and heat, said to evaporate water on the spot. Growing up, my sister and I played Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire, with my sister Kim owning the copy of Ruby and me, Sapphire and eventually, Emerald. Hilariously, I lost my copy of Pokemon Sapphire, despite pouring probably years of my life into it, but Kim’s OG copy of Ruby Version, which didn’t even beat the Elite Four, is still in our family’s possession to this day, and is still playable(with a Groudon still in her party!). The copy of Pokemon Emerald, I gave away along with my Gameboy SP to my friend Minnie, just because I already owned a DS and Pokemon Pearl by that time, and in her case, she didn’t have a Gameboy-type console or a Pokemon game of her own. Groudon is an interesting Pokemon, because even though it’s bright red, a color closely associated with the Fire type, it was originally just a Ground-type Pokemon. It wasn’t until Omega Ruby came out when they introduced Primal Groudon, which then became part-Fire type. For a while, it was actually the heaviest Pokemon in existence as well, fitting of a Pokemon that represented the land(I think the distinction might go to Celesteela and/or Cosmoem now, but I’ve lost track and that might change in the near future with Generation 10 being just around the corner).

Anyways, if you’ve already read the Alpha Old Fashioned Donut post, you’d know that I used the same kind of old fashioned doughnut dough across all three recipes, but I changed up the glazes for each one, just to keep things unique. For Groudon, I wanted to use fresh fruit, just because red fruit is abundant, so I figured why not use up my raspberries and blood oranges that I had from some other recipes? So the flavor is blood orange and raspberry, which is probably a hilarious combination to depict a terrifying, spiky monster that presents the land, but whatever, we’re going with it. I love the flavors of citrus and fruit, so adding those into any dessert is usually a plus in my book(unless it’s paired with coffee, which is pretty unpleasant to put with fruit on its own without something like chocolate to bridge the two). I would say, of the three doughnuts, this one had my favorite glaze flavoring, just because I created this intense reduction out of the fruit, guaranteeing that the glaze would still have a notable blood orange-raspberry flavor to it, despite being 90% made of powdered sugar. I usually hate doughnut glazes because of how cloying they were, and this glaze was probably one of the better balanced ones because of the citrus(I will say that the Rayquaza one using matcha is similarly tempered too, but I just like blood orange a little better than matcha these days). Additionally, of the three recipes, this one was the easiest to pull off, since you do not need to temper any white chocolate for additional decorations(Kyogre), or make multiple flavors AND colors of glaze(Rayquaza), so if you had to just make one fo the three, my vote is surprisingly for Groudon(even though Pokemon Sapphire will always be my favorite game).

Makes 8 doughnuts:
For the old fashion doughnuts:
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
2/3 cups granulated sugar
2oz sour cream
1 egg
4 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
a pinch of salt

In a bowl, combine all of your ingredients until a dough forms. Rest the dough in the refrigerator for 15 minutes. On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to 1/2-inch thickness.

Using a 4-inch and 1-inch round cutter, cut out doughnuts, re-rolling the dough as necessary. Additionally, cut out 2-inch squares, cutting them in half to form rectangles, and place those against the sides of each doughnut to form the alpha-shape first. Then using a knife, cut out a space between the two rectangles to form an omega-shape. Using a knife, score a circular shape into the center of the doughnuts to allow for better rising and cracking.

Chill the doughnuts in the freezer for 10 minutes before attempting to air-fry them at 350 degrees F for 12-14 minutes.

For the blood orange-raspberry glaze:
Juice and zest from 4 blood oranges
1 pint fresh or frozen raspberries
15oz confectioner’s sugar
a pinch of salt
1 tsp activated charcoal

Puree the blood orange juice, zest, and raspberries first, then place into a pot. Reduce the mixture by half, and pass through a sieve to remove any lumps. Mix the reduction with sugar and salt first to form your glaze.

Portion out 1oz of the glaze, and mix in activated charcoal into that and transfer to a piping bag with a small round tip(literally like a dot-shaped hole).

Then with the rest, keep the red glaze covered with cling wrap to prevent it from hardening before pouring over your doughnuts.

For garnish:
White chocolate chips

Coat the tops of the doughnuts first with the red glaze, then pipe on the patterns with the black glaze. Moving quickly, as the glaze will harden, finish with the white chocolate spikes.