There is no better breakfast than koeksisters in the morning.
I was going through my old notes from the last two years looking for my late mom’s koeksister recipe; I finally found it by accident in a box and in my humble opinion, one of the best koeksisters you will ever make and eat.
The balance is just right, I would say perfect – light and airy and so delicious.
Here is the recipe, finally revealed:
Ingredients:
4½ cups of cake flour
1½ cups of lukewarm water
1 tsp of baking powder
1 sachet of Instant yeast
1 tbs of sugar
3 tbs of butter (melted)
1 tsp of salt
1 cup of soft mashed potatoes
3 tsp ground or finely chopped dried naartjie peel
1½ tbs freshly grated ginger (makes all the difference )
1 tsp mix spice
1 tsp aniseed
2 tsp cinnamon
½ a tsp freshly grounded cardamom seeds
Oil for deep frying
Sugar and stick cinnamon for sugaring
Fine coconut
Method:
Mix all ingredients together with warm water. Add water until you get a sticky dough. Dough must be very soft / almost wet.
Knead dough for 10 minutes using a little oil on your hands to stop from sticking, rub some oil over dough, cover with cloth and allow to rise for an hour or when double in size.
Roll out into little ball shapes and fry in oil on medium to high heat until dark brown.
Sugar and cover with fine coconut.
Sugar water
Boil 3 cups of sugar with 3 cups of water and a few cinnamon sticks for about 35 minutes on high heat , then simmer when sugaring the koeksister. Makes about 40 koeksisters.
Its very important to not have a dry and tight dough.
It must be almost sticky; if your dough is tight your yeast won’t have anywhere to expand, resulting in a dense and dry koeksister.
(Recipe by Fatima Sydow)
