Original French Market Beignets
Submitted by frick on September 09, 2009 at 3:10 pm

This makes a large amount, 4 dozen, but the dough is refrigerated so can be made the day before. I have not left it for a second day but I bet it could be used over several days like the 5-minutes a day breads. I'm sure you could make it in the bread machine if the recipe were halved.

The Shadows-on-the-Teche Cookbook is very old, but chock full of recipes from Cajun country. It would be a good addition to your cookbook library.

Beignets, Original French Market, Shadows-on-the-Teche

1 package yeast
½ cup lukewarm water
1 cup boiling water
¼ vegetable shortening
½ cup sugar
1 tbsp. salt
½ tsp nutmeg (optional, MY addition)
1 cup evaporated milk
2 eggs, well beaten
4 cups flour
3 ½ cups flour, approximately
Oil for deep frying
Powdered sugar

Dissolve yeast in warm water and set aside. Pour boiling water over shortening, sugar and salt. Add milk, yeast mixture and eggs.
Stir in four cups of flour and beat vigorously.

Add remainder of flour to make a soft dough (may not take all the flour). Oil bowl and place dough inside and cover. Refrigerate until needed.

Roll out dough to 1/4 –inch and cut into preferred shape. The traditional shape is a rectangle of about 2 X 3 inches. Deep fry at 350 until golden brown. Sprinkle while hot with powdered sugar. Serve hot. Yield: 4 dozen

Note: I cut them with a pizza wheel. Just zip, zip, and they're cut. Accuracy not necessary. The odd little triangles are part of the 'home made' charm.

These puff reliably, getting quite fat and were always made with supermarket AP flour, bleached, since there was no other available. If using a higher protein flour, there MAY be some difficulty rolling. The dough needs to be thin for them to split internally and puff.