Malasadas!

February 22, 2015

Malasadas!

Good day to all! I'm currently cursed with a bad case of cabin fever and symptoms of being too lazy to give a crap about it... which is a pretty interesting combination of things to be feeling simultaneously.

It's time to catch you up on what I've been up to!

Valentine's Day was as awesome as planned - a sleepover with my girlies - mindless TV, pizza and lots and lots of sweet treats! :)

Momma YaYa's pound cake balls (!), mini pound cakes, doughnuts, oreos and some red velvet oreos (which are pretty amazing)

And then a few days later we found ourselves faced with Fat Tuesday... le sigh. Basically my calendar was blocked off as "CHEAT WEEK."

I know that's always optional, but to me "optional" and "hell yeah" are synonymous.

So I made malasadas - a Portuguese version of the Polish paczki, basically a filled doughnut. But the greatest filled doughnut.

You Will Need:

3 large eggs, room temperature

3/4 cup sugar

5 Tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature

3/4 teaspoons salt

5 1/2 cups (or more) all purpose flour

2 envelopes quick rising dry yeast

1 cup hot water (110-120 degrees)

1/3 cup evaporated milk

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

vegetable oil (for frying)

additional sugar

Directions:

Combine 1 egg, 3/4 cup sugar, butter, and salt in a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook. Beat until blended. Add 5 cups flour and yeast; beat 1 minute. Add 1 cup hot water, evaporated milk, and vanilla and beat until well blended. Beat in remaining 2 eggs, then 1/2 cup flour. Beat until dough is smooth, soft and slightly sticky but beginning to come away from sides of the bowl, adding more flour if very sticky, about 10 minutes. Scrape down dough from sides of bowl. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and towel and let rise until almost doubled in volume - about 2 hours.

Punch down dough. Cut into 2 equal pieces - roll out one piece on a lightly floured surface into 12x16" rectangle. Cut into 3 strips and crosswise into 4 strips, making 12 4-inch squares. Repeat with remaining dough.

Pour enough oil into large saucepan to reach depth of 1 1/2 inches. Heat oil to 350-degrees and fry 2 malasadas at a time until puffed and golden brown, turning once, about 3 minutes. Transfer malasadas to paper towels and drain. Repeat with remaining dough, making sure to keep oil at 350-degrees.

While warm, sprinkle (or drown them like I did) malasadas in granulated sugar. Serve warm or at room temperature.

(If you want to fill them, just poke holes in them and get filling!)

I decided to fill these guys with custard and was extremely happy with the recipe I found! You can fill them with jelly too!

Yummy yummy! I've got loads of custard leftover, which I'm thinking would be perfect for some banana cream pie action!

On with the eating!

I also met Janet at Ted's Bulletin for brunch and they are just the greatest!

Their corned beef is to die for - and I basically pour that green goddess dressing over everything before I eat it. Even in my coffee. And their homemade pop tarts. It's SO good.

And we got ringside seats!

Things have calmed down a lot since then - I've been hitting up a LOT of kale salads partially because I'm having heart palpitations and also because I bought an antique vaseline glass juicer and it's everything to me.