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Hot chocolate donut holes are a light and flaky chocolate donut made with just four ingredients. All you need for these mouth-watering donuts is canned biscuit dough, a packet of hot chocolate, sugar, and butter.
These donut holes are a take off of my popular cinnamon donut holes recipe. This is one of the single most popular recipes on the blog. It consistently gets rave reviews on Pinterest and we couldn’t be happier so many people have made these donuts.
Hot Chocolate Donut Holes
My family (and lots of our readers!) love our cinnamon sugar donuts – they’re easy to make and are a perfect weekend treat. Hot and flaky donut holes, made in just 30 minutes. We make these often and I keep the ingredients on hand so that anytime the request comes, I can pop a batch of these homemade donut holes out.
One Sunday morning I was about to make the cinnamon donut holes and realized, too late, that I was out of cinnamon. I’d already opened the can of biscuits, cut them, and melted the butter.
My choices were to just bake plain donut holes, or think of an alternative to the cinnamon. I wanted to keep the recipe just as easy.
That’s when I saw a packet of hot cocoa in my pantry. Bingo! By adding the hot cocoa mix with sugar, I was able to dip the chocolate mixture just like I do with cinnamon sugar.
The chocolate flavor is perfect. It’s not overly chocolaty, and has a light, sweet flavor. It’s just enough of a hint of chocolate to make these divine.
Hot Chocolate Donut Holes Ingredients
Canned biscuits – one can of jumbo of Grands-style biscuits.
Hot chocolate packet – just one, although you could experiment with using two if you want a deeper chocolate flavor. If you add two packets, I’d reduce the amount of sugar.
Sugar – granulated white sugar works for these donuts.
Butter – unsalted butter is best. Melt in the microwave in increments of 20 or 30 seconds at a time so you don’t have butter splattering all over the inside of your microwave.
Baked Donuts, Not Fried
One of the reasons the original donut hole recipe is so popular is because the donut holes are baked, not fried. We followed the same instructions for this hot chocolate version. No need for hot oil and messy counters.
These donuts bake perfectly in the oven and are ready in just 30 minutes. They come out warm and flaky, perfect for breakfast.
How to Make Hot Chocolate Donut Holes
- Preheat oven to 350.
- Spray a shallow casserole dish or pie pan (I love to use a shallow glass pie pan) with cooking spray and set aside.
- Start by removing and separating the canned biscuits. Place on a cutting board and cut each biscuit into fourths. I love to use a bench scraper to do the cutting, but you can use a pizza cutter, or a regular kitchen knife.
- Next, roll each quarter of biscuit dough into a ball. Place the dough in the palm of one hand, and roll the palm of the opposite hand on top until you have a ball.
- Melt the butter.
- Mix the hot chocolate packet with the sugar and mix to combine. Put into a mixing bowl or shallow dish.
- Take each ball of dough (each donut) and dip in the melted butter until the ball is covered.
- Roll the covered dough in the hot cocoa/sugar mixture until covered.
- Place finished donut into the pie dish. You can start at the center, or from the perimeter. Just place each finished donut next to another. They’ll all fit just right. And, they will expand while baking so leave a tiny bit of room between each one.
- Place in the oven and bake for 20 minutes.
What Can You Serve With Donut Holes?
A cup of hot chocolate is the perfect pairing that kids LOVE!
Coffee is great with these donut holes.
And, we like to serve with a side of bacon or sausages and call is breakfast! Of course, you can serve eggs and an entire meal, but they’re just as good solo.
Frosting Alternative
You can add a drizzle of vanilla or chocolate frosting to these donut holes, but it’s not necessary. The donuts will get devoured whether you use frosting or not. But, if you want some frosting just add some powdered sugar and milk together and drizzle over the warm donut holes.
You could also add some cocoa powder to the powdered sugar and milk to make the frosting a little chocolaty.
Want More Recipes Using Canned Biscuits?
Try one of our popular canned biscuit recipes:
Cinnamon sugar donuts in the air fryer
Baked churros with Mexican chocolate sauce
Ingredients
- 1 can refrigerator biscuits any amount of biscuits is fine.
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1 packet hot cocoa
- 4 Tablespoons butter
Instructions
- Preheat oven 350
- Grease a shallow baking pan (I used a glass pie pan) with butter or cooking spray
- Melt butter (microwave in 30 second increments or melt on stovetop), put in small bowl
- Mix together sugar and hot cocoa mix, put in small bowl
- Open package of biscuits and separate individual biscuits
- Cut each biscuit into 4 pieces
- Take each small piece and roll into a ball
- Take each ball and dip in melted butter, covering ball
- Next, roll butter-covered ball into hot cocoa/sugar mixture
- Place hot cocoa-sugar covered ball into baking dish
- Repeat until all biscuit pieces are covered and in baking dish
- Donuts can be touching when in the pan. Just keep moving them around until they all fit.
- Bake 18-20 minutes.
- Let cool 5-10 minutes before serving. These pull apart easily and are quickly devoured!
Nutrition
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