Nutella Bunuelos
Maybe it was the cold weather knocking at my door, signalling fall…which, to me, wherever I am in the world, still means Texas State Fair time, which means Fletcher’s corny dogs and funnel cakes, and well, anything fried.
Which is how I got the idea to make these little gems.
I knew that I wanted to make something like a donut hole, but with a cowgirl twist. Plus there had to be Nutella, because this, after all, is Round 2 of the Twitter Nutella Challenge (for all of the Nutella recipes, simply go to Twitter and type in the hashtag #Nutella).
First, I made a batch of yeast donut dough, and cut out little holes, fried them up, and sprinkled them with sugar, but the result was not impressive. The little balls cooked up picture-perfect, but what they had in looks they lacked in taste. Kind of like Paris Hilton.
If I’d had a can of biscuits in the fridge, I probably would have cracked one open and called it a day. But I didn’t, and besides, that wouldn’t be very sporting, now would it?
No one’s gonna start calling me Demi Homemade.
My answer: Bunuelos, fried Mexican puffs, with a generous squirt of Nutella inside.
They’re fast. Easy. And you can eat tons of them. They are so small, you know.
I used a syringe to get the Nutella inside the little holes, which worked out just fine. Seems kinda weird, but that’s all I had on hand. They may look at you funny when you tell then at the CVS that you’re shooting up Nutella, but they’ve probably heard stranger stories than that.
Nutella Bunuelos
3 ½ cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
¼ cup butter
2 eggs
½ cup whole milk
vegetable oil, for frying
1 cup sugar
½ cup Nutella
2-3 tablespoons whole milk
1. Sift flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Put in bowl or food processor.
2. Add cubes of butter and mix until mixture looks like coarse meal.
3. Add slightly beaten eggs and milk. Pulse until dough becomes a solid mass. If dough is too sticky, add a bit more flour.
4. Roll out dough to 1/4-inch thickness and cut small circles (I used an olive oil cap!).
5. Let circles rest for 15 minutes, at least.
6. Put oil in deep pot, and turn heat on medium high. When the temperature is at 360, carefully drop small batches of the dough circles into the oil. Work fast — these will only take 20-30 seconds total to cook.
7. Roll in sugar, and with a syringe, poke a hole in the sides and squeeze a bit of Nutella inside. Yummy, right?
