Wednesday, February 11, 2015

I Wanna Be At Mardi Gras: Beignets

I am trying out a new graphic for my "I Wanna Be" food series. I am not the best a graphic designing. Can you tell : )

Next Tuesday is Fat Tuesday otherwise know as Mardi Gras. I have always wanted to go to New Orleans. I guess Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles introduce me to the allure of this city. MTV in the 90's introduced the wildness of Mardi Gras. Since I cannot go to New Orleans anytime soon and I got a deep fryer for Christmas...Beignets

I used a recipe from the Joy of Cooking cookbook. Taking into account copyright, I won't write out the recipe here. There are many beignets recipes online. The one in the Joy of Cooking uses yeast, which I believe most of the other recipes do too.
Blending the dough together was a feat of strength. The recipe called for it to be blended together with a large spoon which I took to mean "no electric mixer". This took some time. Then the dough has to rest 12 to 24 hours covered in the refrigerator. 
After more than 12 hours it didn't seem to rise much. This had me worried.
Then the fun part.
Rolling the dough 1/8 inch think and cutting it into small squares. At this point it started to remind me of making sopapillas, which I love.
After that the frying begins.
I use peanut oil in my fryer after having a bit of a disaster with another oil. I foolishly used vegetable oil when I first got the deep fryer without realizing how bad that is. The first clue: if you are anywhere in your house when the oil is heating up and your eyes burn, not good. Just some fyi from my own errors. I'll probably find out peanut oil is bad too : P
Back to the beignets.
These doughnut/fritter/sopapilla creations swell up in the fryer and turn a delightful golden brown. After they have been cooked on both sides, remove from the fryer and cover in powered sugar.
Served warm they are so good. Basically sugar covered fried dough. So bad yet so good. 



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