Lemon gluten free donuts are the perfect homemade baked donuts to make for breakfast or brunch, and these gluten free lemon donuts are dairy-free too! This easy gluten free donuts recipe is quick; the little lemon donuts are ready to eat in under 20 minutes.

Lemon gluten free donuts are the snack my kids love when they get home from school. Drizzle icing on top, or eat these lemon gluten free donuts plain! They are bursting with delicious lemon flavor!

Just look at those little lemon gluten free donuts, and you can see how moist and delicious they are!

If you love donuts as much as we do, you will check out my BEST gluten free donut recipes!

My gluten free lemon tart recipe and my gluten free lemon bundt cake recipes are other great ways to use up those lemons :-). A delicious breakfast addition would be these gluten free lemon poppy seed muffins.

Why these donuts are great:

These moist and delicious gluten free donuts are so quick and easy to make with this Babycakes Mini Donut Maker. From start to finish, we had little lemon donuts in under 15 minutes!! If you don’t have a donut maker, I include directions for baking in the oven!

I love to make these donuts for kids. This easy gluten-free donuts recipe is much less guilty because I used applesauce to keep these gluten-free doughnuts super moist and reduce the sugar in this recipe.

For even more delicious lemon desserts, check out my Gluten Free Lemon Desserts roundup!

Top Pick
King Arthur, Measure for Measure Flour 3 lbs

This is one of my favorite gluten-free flour blends for cookies, cakes, pie crust, biscuits, and muffins! (Do not use this flour blend for yeast recipes.)

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Ingredient notes:

  • Gluten free flour blend – I tested this recipe using Bob’s Red Mill 1 to 1 Gluten Free Flour Blend and King Arthur’s Measure for Measure Gluten Free Blend. That doesn’t mean others will not work; I have not tested other flours.
  • Almond flour – helps add some protein, so there isn’t a big sugar crash after eating one or two of these….(okay, maybe more like four or five. These are hard to resist!)
  • If your gluten free flour blend doesn’t contain xanthan gum or guar gum, please add 1 teaspoon.
  • Non-dairy milk – I used almond milk, but other dairy-free kinds of milk will work. I do not recommend canned coconut milk.

Variations:

The beauty of this recipe is that you can easily customize the flavor.

  • Omit the lemon, and you have a delicious vanilla donut.
  • Add white chocolate chips.
  • Add blueberries or raspberries, which would taste delicious with this lemon donut.

Recipe step-by-step directions:

Photos of the lemon donuts steps 1 and 2.

Step 1: Add the dry ingredients to a bowl and whisk to blend.

Step 2: In a smaller bowl, add the wet ingredients and whisk to blend.

Lemon donuts photos of steps 3 and 4.

Step 3: Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix until “just barely mixed.” This will help keep your donuts light and fluffy.

Step 4: Preheat your donut maker. Add batter to each donut section when the light indicates it is hot. Close the lid and cook for 3-4 minutes. Remove the cooked donuts to a rack to cool.

Step 5: Allow the donuts to cool completely. Drizzle icing over the donuts, or dip in white chocolate.

Donut pan baking instructions:

I get this question a lot from my readers. I tend to use this little donut maker in most of my donut recipes. It is easy to use, making my donuts taste like they were fried…but they aren’t!

It takes about 5 minutes to bake donuts in a donut maker. If you prefer to use a donut pan, bake these gluten free lemon donuts at 350º F for 20 minutes. Remove the donuts from the pan onto a cooling rack.

A single Gluten Free Lemon Donut with a bite taken out so you can see how light and fluffy the inside is.

Tips and Recipe FAQ:

I suggest spraying the donut pan or donut maker with a little coconut oil so the outside of the donut gets a little crispy.

Can you make this recipe nut-free?

You can easily make this gluten free lemon donut recipe nut-free! To make these NUT FREE, instead of the almond flour, add ¼ extra gluten free flour blend.

Can you make them dairy-free?

This recipe is naturally dairy-free. You can create a delicious dairy-free donut glaze by mixing 2 cups of powdered sugar with ¼ cup of almond milk.

Can you use coconut sugar or another low-glycemic sweetener instead of sugar?

You can definitely use coconut sugar in this gluten free lemon donut recipe. Note your donuts will be more of a brown color as coconut sugar is dark like brown sugar. To make a sugar-free lemonade drizzle, use honey with a small amount of lemon juice.

The top view of lemon donuts.

Reader Raves:

A photo of reader Ann M's finished lemon donuts.
Here is a photo of reader Ann M’s finished lemon donuts.

These were very good. Didn’t have applesauce so used vanilla yogurt. Added a tsp of agar-agar. Used Monk fruit as sweetener. Drizzled with honey and lemon mixture.”

Rachel St. M, Pinterest user.

More gluten free donut recipes:

stacks of lemon donuts

Gluten Free Lemon Donuts

Sandi Gaertner
One bite and you will be hooked on these delicious gluten free lemon donuts! They are full of fresh lemon flavor.
4.80 from 39 votes
dairy free allergen icon
gluten free allergy icon
soy free allergy icon
Prep Time 10 minutes
Cook Time 15 minutes
Total Time 25 minutes
Course Gluten Free Dessert Recipes, Gluten Free Donut Recipes
Cuisine American
Servings 18 donuts
Calories 167 kcal

*As an Amazon Associate, I earn a small commission from qualifying purchases.

Ingredients
  

  • 1 ¼ cup gluten free flour blend * see note
  • ¾ cup almond flour * see note
  • ¾ cup sugar
  • ½ teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 2 large eggs
  • ½ cup applesauce
  • cup coconut oil melted
  • 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  • ½ cup almond milk * see note

Instructions
 

  • In a large bowl, combine all dry ingredients and whisk together to blend.
  • In a medium bowl, add all wet ingredients and whisk.
  • Pour wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix well.
  • Preheat the Babycakes Mini Donut Maker.
  • Put a little dough into each section of the donut maker.
  • Cook for 5 minutes until done.
  • Remove and put onto cooling rack.
  • Ice, frost, or eat plain.

Oven Baking:

  • Preheat your oven to 350º F. Add your donut batter to a donut pan. Bake 20-22 minutes until the donuts are baked.

Notes

  1. I have tested this recipe with King Arthur Measure for Measure GF and Bob’s Red Mill 1 to 1 GF blend. That doesn’t mean others will not work, I just have not tested other flours.
  2. If your gluten free flour blend doesn’t contain xanthan gum or guar gum, please add 1 teaspoon.
  3. I highly suggest using almond flour and not almond meal. Almond meal is more coarse and will make your donuts grainy.
  4. I used almond milk but other dairy-free kinds of milk will work but I do not recommend canned coconut milk. I used ½ cup, but starchier gluten free flour blends may need more milk.
  5. These will donuts keep up to 4 days in an air-tight container, or up to 4 months in the freezer.

SPECIAL NOTE

Please know that every gluten free flour blend has a different starch to grain ratio. If you use a blend I didn’t test, you may need to adjust your moisture levels in your baked goods.

Nutrition

Serving: 1gCalories: 167kcalCarbohydrates: 16gProtein: 2gFat: 11gSaturated Fat: 7gTrans Fat: 1gCholesterol: 18mgSodium: 38mgPotassium: 36mgFiber: 1gSugar: 9gVitamin A: 28IUVitamin C: 1mgCalcium: 28mgIron: 1mg
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Nutrition Disclaimer

Nutritional information is an estimate provided to you as a courtesy. You should calculate the actual nutritional information with the products and brands you are using with your preferred nutritional calculator.

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Recipe Rating




99 Comments

  1. 5 stars
    Had everything for these and hadn’t used the donut maker I inherited from my grandma yet. Yum! I did have some blueberries I need to finish up, so lemon blueberry donuts for a morning snack. I offered to glaze them, but Hubs preferred them plain.

  2. When making nut free, you say (in two places) to substitute “1/4 extra” of the gluten free flour in place of the almond flour. Does that mean “1/4 CUP extra”?

  3. Where is the milk in this recipe? I don’t see it in the ingredients, but you mention it in the notes and also in some of the comments.

    1. Hi Liza, you can make them nut-free, but you need to use less flour than the almond flour quantity. Almond flour absorbs a lot less moisture. To make these NUT FREE, instead of the almond flour, add ¼ extra gluten free flour blend.

    2. First off, just a quick “housekeeping note”, your actual recipe lists almond MEAL for the ingredient, but the Amazon link, and the footnote, both refer to/strongly suggest using almond FLOUR, NOT almond meal. So that might be worth fixing on the recipe, so as not to confuse readers/cause any problems for those who might skip the footnotes. 🥰

      Secondly, We loved these donuts! We did replace the coconut oil with avocado, (with three littles and no microwave, taking the time to melt the coconut oil on stove/oven, and then wait for it to cool a bit so as not to fry the eggs in the batter, is just not going to happen. 🤦🏻‍♀️) so the batter was on the runnier side. Because of this, we had to fiddle around with the time/temp a bit to find out what worked best, and the *ahem* 2nd, 3rd, or 4th batch we made, we did skimp a bit on the liquid ingredients/added a smidge more flour to help with the batter consistency… so we’re still tweaking to find the best way to use the recipe with avocado oil, but overall, they were super yummy! 😋 TIP: If you LOVE lemon like we do, adding several drops of lemon essential oil really helps punch up the lemon flavor.

      1. Hi Ariel, thanks for the housekeeping note. I will check that. As for the avocado oil, it shouldn’t be any different than the coconut oil. What gluten free flour blend are you using? The starchier mixes tend to turn out more liquidy than others. My guess is that is your problem, not the fact that you are using avocado oil.

  4. Can I still deep fry these? We are having a family donut day and I wanted something for my son in law. I don’t have a donut maker or pan.

    1. Hi Becky, I am not sure if the donuts will keep their shape as the dough is a bit wetter than regular fried donut dough. Try my fried gluten free fried jelly donuts recipe. That dough is better for frying.

  5. To make it nut free, you said to add 1/4 extra gf flour. Do you mean to omit almond flour and add 1/4 cup extra of gf flour or to add 5/8 cup extra? That would be 1/4 of 1 1/4 cup. Thanks!

    1. Hi Betty, I haven’t tried canola oil in this recipe, but I don’t see it would cause a problem…please come back and let us know how it turns out.

  6. I am celiac so i eat truly gluten free which means no grains what-so-ever thus no Gluten free flours. Ay idea on other flours like Cassava to replace the first ingredient in your list… your ” gluten free flour blend”?I have been checking out all of your baking and they look yummy but include this so I would end up in the ER if i used it.man other than that this recipe looks spot on great.

    1. Hi Sandi, that is a tough question. I use Casava flour, but haven’t tried it in this recipe. Cassava is very light and airy compared to the regular gluten free flour blend I used for this recipe (Bob’s Red Mill 1 to 1 GF Blend.) I will add trying it out with Cassava flour instead of my blend, but it may be a bit before I have time to make it. If you try first, do let me know how it turns out.

  7. I see alot of your recipes are also dairy free. if I substituted milk and butter for your non dairy items in the same amounts would they still work?

    1. Hi Makayla, it should be fine to substitute butter and milk, but please know I haven’t tested it. I would love it if you would come back and let us know how it works for you. Thank you!